


The Price of Love

by nigoi



Category: Inazuma Eleven, Inazuma Eleven: Ares no Tenbin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Dimension Travel, Fix-It, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Male-Female Friendship, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:42:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 60,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27121286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nigoi/pseuds/nigoi
Summary: For Shiratoya Nae, it starts like a normal morning. But then, her poster is missing and her photo is missing and her friends treat her like a stranger, and she knows ---  sheknows--- that Atsuya has pulled a very bad prank on her. She sets out to find him. It ends up with fighting aliens.All in all, just a normal Tuesday.-Or: Shiratoya Nae dimension-time-travels to the original Aliea timeline.
Relationships: Fubuki Atsuya & Shiratoya Nae, Fubuki Shirou & Shiratoya Nae, Raimon Eleven & Shiratoya Nae
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	1. I: Hokkaido

**Author's Note:**

> so, this is my ina11bigbang fic!! look at the word count and watch how it got away from me.
> 
> the title comes from the quote: "Grief never ends... But it changes. It's a passage, not a place to stay. Grief is not a sign of weakness, nor a lack of faith... It's the price of love."

Nae opens her eyes to a white ceiling.

That’s normal — that ceiling is the first thing she sees on most days, that dirty white that has managed not to crack through countless snow storms and graduation parties and badly-aimed hissatsus. Really, it’s a wonder that it hasn’t fallen down, that it’s greeted Nae every day since she moved here three years ago, both on her good and her bad days. So yes, today is a normal day, but.

But!

_ But _ . 

Where is her iDOLM@STER poster?! Where is her  _ baby _ ?!

Okay, Nae,  _ breathe _ . It probably has fallen down and is lying somewhere in this room. No matter it was practically fused with the ceiling and there aren’t any marks on it, there’s got to be an explanation. A very, very good explanation. There has to be, or else someone will get killed. Maybe Shirou. Probably Atsuya.

Under the bed? Nope. Under her covers? Nope. In her drawers? Nuh-uh. Inside her wardrobe? Behind the curtains? On the other side of the door? Under the bed again? No, no, no and no. Nae’s fingers dig into her scalp, and she lets out a high-pitched yell. She got it not even a year ago in an anime convention, she can’t have lost it! C’mon, someone has pulled a prank on her for sure!

Except her dock has a lock (thanks, daddy), and there was no way to remove that poster without leaving any sort of marks (Atsuya tried once). Meanwhile, her wardrobe has different, smaller clothing than last time she checked (just before going to bed last night), and the pink frame on her desk doesn’t contain the cute picture of her, Atsuya and Shirou, but one of her and her father.

...Weird.

Well, Atsuya must have forced the door open or something, because there’s no other explanation. And she’ll make him pay! Let’s see… Does she take his school bag or his dear little teddy bear? Mmmmm, decisions, decisions.

Determined, she opens the door and struts towards the courtyard. Now, where’s Atsuya one normal Monday at eight in the morning? She’s never met him earlier than nine, so who knows! She’ll have to ask someone!

Oh, there’s Juka, clutching some books and dragging her feet towards the main building! “Hi, Juka!” she says, waving her hand and running towards her friend with a bright smile. She’s always glad to see her!

Juka stops as if someone has caught her committing a murder which, who knows, maybe it’s true. Except it probably isn’t, but oh well. She looks at Nae with her eyebrows raised, retreating a little on herself and - what? Since when does Juka not smile when she sees Nae? Is she okay?

“Are you okay?” she asks, because she’s never been one to internalise. 

After staring at her for a long second, Juka shakes her head and smiles politely up at her. And since when is Juka just polite at her? Friends aren’t polite! Friends are rude and cute and assholes! “Oh, it’s nothing, Shiratoya. What do you need?”

Nae blinks, and her hand grasps her shirt on the chest area, right where a hammer’s just slammed. “Shi - Shiratoya?”

Juka suddenly looks nervous, hugging her books close to her. “Is… that not your name?”

“NO!” she whines,and maybe it’s a bit too loud, because Juka flinches. Quietly, she repeats, “No. It’s Nae. You know it.” Juka is silent, staring at her as if she’s grown a fourth head or whatever the number is. Nae sighs. That’s not important now, she guesses. First, Atsuya has to die. “I - ...do you know where Atsuya is?”

Juka blinks, and takes a step back. Her knuckles have gone hard from how hard she’s clutching her books. “Atsuya? Who’s that?”

Oh, come on! Is Juka on the prank too? Is this why she’s being so weird? Because if it is, they’ll have to have a nice, long chat. “Can you at least tell me where Shirou is?” she begs, and if she tells her she doesn’t know who Shirou is either, Nae is going to  _ snap _ .

“Uh… He’s by - by the football pitch. ...Why -”

She’s already running. “Okay, thanks, Juka!”

If Shirou doesn’t know where Atsuya is, Nae’ll eat her hand.

When Nae approaches the pitch, she sees a figure from afar, and stops. 

Is that person who’s staring with melancholy at a football Shirou? The white, spiky, soft hair is unmistakable, but… since when is Shirou’s face so round and squishy? Since when does he wear a fluffy scarf suspiciously similar to Atsuya’s? (Nae knows it’s fluffy because she’s squeezed it once, when Atsuya fell asleep on a bench.) Since when… Since when are his eyes so  _ sad _ ?

She purses her lips, narrows her eyes, but no matter how much she looks, the differences don’t go away. Really, when she went to sleep last night, Shirou was fine. Have him and Atsuya fought? Every time Shitou is sad it’s Atsuya’s fault, so it’s likely it’s that.

Still… she can’t shake the feeling there’s something she’s missing here. And as a certified gossip girl, she doesn’t like it.

Eventually, Shirou must have felt her stare or something, because he turns his head to smile kindly at her. Shirou  _ never  _ smiles kindly, unless you are a pretty girl who coincidentally is not his friend. That means he doesn’t smile kindly at Nae — just arrogantly, or sadly, or ecstatically or plain normal happy. 

“Do you need something?” Oh, even his voice is kind and soft and if it came from literally any other person in the world (except Atsuya), she would have melted in a pile of goo and crushes right then and there. Shirou readjusts his scarf, so that it covers the barest edge of his lips, and man, why does it have to be Shirou? Why does that pretty face belong to the second most asshole person in the world (after Atsuya)? “You’ve been staring for quite a long time.”

“Uuuh…” Nae says, eloquently, then shakes her head. Stop acting so distracted, Nae! You can’t give him new teasing material for Atsuya! (Damn gossipy twins.) “Er, yes! Do you know where Atsuya is?”

Shirou’s eyes immediately go dark, unfocused. With a small, confused voice, he asks, “At… suya?”

If Nae’s instincts weren’t screaming  _ something’s wrong! something’s wrong! _ to her, this would have been the nail on the coffin that confirms her that yes, this is a joke. As it is, Shirou seems to be serious, so, what the hell. Shirou never speaks with a voice that… hurt. If someone has done something to him— If  _ Atsuya _ has done something to him— 

Nae’ll beat them up! With her bare fists!

“Er, Shirou, are you okay? What’s the matter?” She takes a step forward, and her chest kind of stings when Shirou takes one back. She presses on. “You know, Atsuya. Reddish hair, arrogant smile, a scarf, wears oranges and blues, got held back a year? Your brother?”

And then, the moment the word  _ brother _ is out of her lips, Shirou’s entire body closes off. His fingers twitch, and his arms envelop his torso for a second, before he seemingly remembers he’s not in private. The grimace on his face goes back to a simper, but the darkness in his eyes doesn’t go away — no, it grows. He says, “Sorry, I have… I have to go.”

And he runs away, leaving Nae blinking at his trail, with something hanging heavy on her heart. 

What… has just happened? Has she said something to offend him? But no matter how much she rewinds their conversation, she’s behaved like a real polite person — a gentlewoman, one might say — all the way through. No: something else is wrong here, and she hopes to God it’s not what she suspects, what she’s been burying under her thoughts since she woke up and refused to look at the mirror.

And Nae’s a bit of a coward, but not too much, so she dashes back to her bedroom and prays it’s not, it’s not, it’s not, because what will she do if it is?

But her reflection doesn’t lie. Her pudgy cheeks don’t lie, her knee-long hair doesn’t lie, her lost centimeters don’t lie. Her missing poster doesn’t lie, the changed picture on her table doesn’t lie, and the small clothes on her wardrobe doesn’t lie. And, certainly, the date she’s been avoiding to look at in her phone doesn’t lie.

She’s in the past. She’s in her first year of junior high, when she was still kind of a jerk and before joining the football club. It’s the start of the year, she’s just dropped running ‘cause of boredom and she’s aimless, and it’s not until she sees Atsuya play that she becomes infatuated with football.

But that still hasn’t happened here. She’s still sliding through life like it’s a particularly annoying obstacle course. Her friends are all fake, but she is — was — too, so it’s fair and she can’t ask for more. Some nights when she can’t sleep, she wonders if she should try and change for the better, but on the next morning the thought is forgotten.

Her knees buckle and her ass plants on the floor as she skims through her contact list on her phone. It’s full of names she doesn’t recognise. Nae knows she has bad memory, but there’s no way she can forget so many people, especially — she checks the message history — not people she’s spoken so much to. And she’s in another class, different from what it was in her first year!

An idea comes to her. Could it be—

Could it be that, on top of time travel, she’s also on an alternate dimension? Could something  _ that _ weird happen to her? 

...Yeah, okay, why not. Stranger things have happened, she guesses, and if not then she’s just that unlucky. 

Frankly, this is more likely to be a strangely detailed dream than dimensional time travel, but something tells her it’s not. And she’s never been one not to trust her instincts. This is way too real to be a product of her mind — she doesn’t have that much imagination.

That said, she buries her head in her hands and screams her throat raw, mourning all her lost precious people. When will she see them next? Why is she here? Will she get close to this world’s version of her friends? Why is she here? Will she be able to return? Why is she here? How can she return?

When the bell signaling the start of class rings, she gets up, wipes her eyes, licks her lips, and sets off to live this new life. Maybe her eyes are red and her heart is heavy, but she can’t spend all her life wallowing. No, she won’t waste away like an unhappy flower, even if she’s as pretty as one.

(But the thoughts don’t go away, she just tucks them in a corner of her mind, buried under bunnies and flowers and hopes. What is this world? She wants to go back. Why does she have another life? It was enough with time travel, she didn’t need dimension travel, too. What’s different? Her contact list… Why is Shirou so sad? Why does he have a fluffy scarf just like - ? Why did he react so weirdly at the name of - ?

Where... where is Atsuya?)

(...Nevermind.)

Get ready, life, because here she comes!

Unfortunately, classes are as uninteresting as always, and time slogs away slowly. However, Nae is a third-year student at heart, and, as such, she has mastered the art of not paying attention while looking like she does and jotting down notes without really thinking about it. 

Fortunately, she shares classes with Shirou, so she can squint at him from time to time to see what his deal is. There doesn’t seem to be anything, at least not outwardly. He somehow exudes an aura of weary sadness, and he’s been late to class for some reason, but his quiet smile hides it pretty well. 

He’s The Popular Boy™, which, like, obviously. It’s the same in her world. She’s the Popular Girl™, too. There are things that are simply constants, no matter where you are: people breathe, eyes blink, and Shirou and Nae are the governors of their class.

Anyways, it turns out her friends are some random people in her class, to whom she’s never ever spoken too. Okay, she guesses this Nae has, but Nae Nae, the important Nae, herself, doesn’t even know these people. She feels a little bad about deceiving them and telling them she has to go to the bathroom and then sneaking out of the building, but really, there’s no other solution.

And it turns out to be a good decision, because, while she’s walking towards the football club (to join it, obviously, because she’s nothing without football), she spots a team wearing a blue and white jacket.

Nae blinks. _ What’s Raimon doing here, so far from their home and in the off-season? _ , she thinks. And then, squinting:  _ Hey! This is the original Raimon! The one before Norika! Someoka’s! The legends! I can’t miss a match between them and Hakuren!  _

And so, she follows them. At a distance, of course, because she’s creepy but not creepy enough to sneak into the group and pretends she knows them. Well, not pretending because she knows them — some of them, at least — but she doesn’t know them and it’s confusing and let’s stop this line of thinking because it depresses her.

In the middle of the group, a head with shaved pink hair on top remains the only one not talking, and oh my god that’s Someoka! She has to speak to him, she has to, she has to, oh god she really needs to do it or she’ll  _ die _ . But right now, she can’t, argh. ...She’ll do that later, after the match, when she has an excuse.

_ Oooooh! You were so cool in there, Someoka-senpai! _ , Nae can imagine herself saying, and she kicks herself mentally, because she has outlived her fangirl fase, no matter how fun it is to tease Someoka and probably make him blush. On the other hand, she hasn’t really outlived it, so that’s it, she’ll say that.

And man, they’re kicking footballs and holding footballs and she thinks one random person there is kissing a football, which reminds her she wants to play football too, and was in fact about to do that before she spotted them.

She’s still curious, though, so she hides behind a tree and watches until their match against Hakuren starts. At that point, she decides that it’s a bit silly to hide when other people are sitting on the stands (well, ““stands””; more like ancient wooden benches) and she goes sit on there, too. She’s had enough of creepily stalking for one day, now’s the turn to stalk uncreepily, yay.

The match is pretty great, although a little boring when compared to, as a completely random example, a Hakuren vs. Inakuni Raimon, a culmination of three years of rivalry in a stadium full of people roaring and cheering and the players sweaty and about to go into overtime if one doesn’t score a goal. They lock eyes with the rivals and know for certain that the other person is feeling the same consuming excitement as them and then the whistle blows and -

Yeah. Completely random example. This match is still good, though.

Her eyes don’t leave Shirou except to look at Someoka’s pink hair from time to time, but hey, who can blame her, that color is so cute, and it fits so weirdly nicely with his skin tone. She can’t look at it too much, ‘cause it’s more important to figure out why Shirou is a defender here so soon. In her time, it wasn’t until her second year that Shirou confessed he preferred being a defender, and that he was only a forward ‘cause of Atsuya. 

This Shirou sure has gone fast, huh?

Oh, nevermind. He’s shooting now. And spewing arrogant tauntings. And with the spikes of his hair pointing up. And…. with orange eyes? Weird. Weird, and weirdly like Atsuya sometimes. Like this time. That’s a funny coincidence.

(Yes. Totally a coincidence.)

The match ends and Shirou is back to normal, which. Okay. She’ll roll with whatever idiosyncrasies this Shirou has. 

Raimon and Shirou go to train or skate or something, and Nae is kind of tempted to butt in and join, but frankly, it’s been a long day, and she doesn’t have the strength to push her way into a group she doesn’t belong to, not today, not right now. Instead, she sighs and walks up to her room and collapses on top of her bed. She’s asleep immediately, and doesn’t dream anything.

(She  _ does _ dream — she just doesn’t remember it in the morning.

She dreams about fiery hair, about an arrogant grin, about a victory sign flashed at her. It’s hazy and she’s dizzy, so she doesn’t answer, but the grin doesn’t waver as a hand grabs her wrist and makes her high-five another. She still doesn’t react, which is when the grin turns into a worried frown.

Before the mouth can move, before the words come - she wakes up.)

The next morning, she’s full of energy! She’s ready to rock, about to burst, all set, good to go, eager to triumph! Get ready, life, ‘cause Nae is heeere!

She struts towards the football club, ready to finally,  _ finally _ start to meet her friends again. She’s  _ so  _ excited! So, so, so, so, so very excited! What new secrets will these people have for her to discover? She can’t wait to know!

On her way to the club, she passes by the outside football pitch, which is full of people. Ooooooh, another match? Let’s see, let’s see! This will be good practice, good for getting to know everyone again! So, like yesterday, she descends the stairs again and sits on the stand closest to the field. 

Raimon is still here - which, great! More Someoka! Maybe this time she can tease him. Hakuren is also here, but… they’re not on the field — they’re sitting on the benches on the other side, which, alright? This is their home, but if they want to lend their field so that some poor saps who’re not used to the cold play, that’s alright, she guesses. So, who’s the other team?

Her eyes slide from Raimon’s yellow and blue uniform to… the ugliest brown she’s ever seen. She starts at the shoes (wide, clunky, hideous) and starts going up and up, increasingly more horrified with each centimeter of cloth. A  _ jewel  _ in the chest area? Seriously, whose idea is that? It’s not only highly unfashionable, it’s dangerous. What would happen if someone fell on it? Really, who is so unlucky to have to wear - that? What school is so cruel?

Finally, she reaches their faces, and gasps. “ _ Midorikawa-kun _ ?!” she screeches, very, very disappointed. Midorikawa is - was one of the most fashionable guys she knew, so what is this abomination?! ...Wait, she doesn’t know him here, should she be using -kun? “Midorikawa-san?” she tries, but nah, she can’t do that. Let’s stick to old habits. “Midorikawa-kun!”

The rest of the hideously-clothed team blink at her, pale and with varying expressions of horror in their faces. She blinks and thinks back to what she’s just said, but no, nothing offensive. Why are they staring at her like that, then?

“I do not know that Midorikawa-kun you speak of,” Midorikawa says, in a… weird, formal tone of voice. Okay? Is... he trying to pull a prank on her? Is this a prank? Well, if it is, there’s no way she’ll fall, not after sharing a building with Atsuya for three years! “I am Reize, the captain of Gemini Storm, and your new ruler!”

And here, he bursts into maniacal laughter.  _ Yeah, definitely a prank. _ Nae snickers a bit at Midorikawa — or, well, Reize, if she humours him… Nah, she prefers Midorikawa — Midorikawa’s exaggerated expression, from his wide eyes to his coiled hands to his wide open mouth. Heh, how fun. 

“Oh, I must have mistaken you for another guy, sorry,” she says, because she wants to see where this prank goes. Patting her bench, she grins at him. “Go on, go on. Pretend I haven’t said anything. I’m just here, watching things unfold.”

And so Midorikawa goes on, and she watches things unfold — namely, a match starts, because that’s the only thing that happens ever. Even if her team isn’t playing (well, not really her team, not yet, ‘cause she still has to join), a Raimon vs. Any Team Ever promises to be fun, especially if the prank keeps going. 

She props an elbow on her thigh and leans her chin against her hand, smiling. Everyone is getting ready, so there are probably five minutes before the match starts. Let’s see who’s playing… Endou, a random girl, some random boys, Kabeyama, Midorikawa and some Aliea guys… Oh, and then there’s that pretty coach, Raimon’s, who’s staring at Nae as if she wants to dissect her. She waves, and the couch’s frown deepens.

The whistle blows, and that’s when the match starts.

Once again, Nae doesn’t take her eyes off Shirou (apparently, he’s playing with Raimon), whose placid smile twitches from time to time. Hah! That’s probably a sign of a deep unrest he’s trying to hide! 

Wait, she shouldn’t think that so triumphantly, should she? She clears her mental throat and starts again: Oh, no! That’s probably a sign of mental unrest! :(

Or that she’s staring too hard. Or both, which is likely the correct answer.

Anyways, this Shirou is almost as good a defender as her Shirou is (was). He seems… more in touch with his position, probably ‘cause he’s never been a forward, but he’s two or three years younger, and it’s easy to notice in the little things: how he hesitates a second before moving, how he has to think for a moment about his eyes following the ball instead of the players’ faces, how he has to scan the field before passing to his teammates.

Even so, every player is younger than she knows (knew) them as, so he’s not the only one falling into these little things. In fact, he’s a slightly better player here than he was in her first first year, if her memory doesn’t lie, so he pulls Raimon to a victory.

She claps when the final whistle sounds, and, now that she’s at it, decides to wolf-whistle too. “Good match, good match!”

Endou, who’s always been her favourite from this team, extends his arm towards her, hand forming a thumbs-up. She returns it. Heh, what a sweet boy. Now that she’s here, she has to make the most of her time and speak with him a little mo— 

A purple ball slams against the floor. 

Nae’s eyes snap towards the ball, which is innocently standing on a crater, a foot pushing it against the ground. Her eyes go up (what are those knee pads?!), up (black and white, how original), up ( _ another _ gemstone?!), up (wow, that’s a nice scarf, pity the other parts of the outfit are so ugly) and up, until she’s staring right into… black sclera. 

How creepy. 

...Wait. She knows this person. “Saginuma, is that you?” she says, and tries not to show her unsettlement in her voice. Saginuma has never been a model in terms of fashion choices (although there are models that aren't the greatest either), but come  _ on _ ! This is an offense to the eyes!

Saginuma looks at her in the eyes, and the black sclera makes his smile feel threatening, even though normally it would be kind with a hint of arrogance — you know, the kind of smile that people are scared of, but only because they don’t know the person who’s smiling. The Mildly Awkward Smile.

There’s a long pause. “Don’t say words you do not understand, you foolish little girl,” he answers, staring at her like he can see her soul, and hey! 

“I know for a fact I’m older than you!” She pouts. Her birthday is in February and his is in September. She remembers ‘cause, for some reason, the Aliea team always decides to throw the biggest and greatest party of the year on his birthday. To make him feel included or something cute like that. “So don’t go around spewing lies! And don’t insult people, that’s rude! Even if I’m foolish, you shouldn’t say it!”

There’s a rustle, and, from the corner of her eyes, Nae can see Raimon’s coach get up from her bench, mouth parted open, and looking at Nae as if she was some strange animal in a zoo. She doesn’t squirm, but that’s only ‘cause she’s pretty weirded out. What a strange woman. 

She focuses her attention on Saginuma again — she can’t go around lecturing about rudeness and then being rude herself. “Anyways, if you want to continue this prank, you can, I won’t spill.” Although she kind of has right now, hasn’t she? “I - I mean, prank? What prank? I don’t know about no prank.” Phew! Saved. “Continue with what you were going to say, please.”

She makes a gesture of zipping her mouth and throwing away the key. Saginuma stares at her for a long second, but then he turns to Midorikawa and starts saying something about losing and dishonour and blah blah blah. It’s a bit worrying, how Midorikawa and his team pales, but she thinks nothing of it.

But then Saginuma shoots the ball and the team has disappeared and he says something ominous that implies they died, and Nae’s on her feet, a soundless scream spilling out of her lips. 

What the hell what the hell what the  _ hell _ . What the hell has just happened. Saginuma can’t have killed him… right? It doesn’t fit anything she knows about the boy, as second-hand as it is. Then again, this is another world, but… Are things really so different here?

(Yes.)

No! She refuses to think about that! People don’t change like that, no matter how different their experiences are. And they can’t be that different, because he’s still playing football and he still hangs around the same people and his smile is the same, even his eyes are not. There has to be a good explanation here, one that doesn’t involve death over a sport or fourteen-year-olds turning into killers. There  _ has  _ to be. 

While she’s still mentally processing this unsettling new development, Saginuma mocks Raimon and vanishes, which increases slightly the chances of survival of Midorikawa’s team, who went away in the same way. Unless Saginuma has decided to kill himse - Okay, that’s enough, her mind is going to pretty weird places she prefers not to poke at.

It’s still first thing in the morning, but it's been a long time since she’s felt so tired, even counting yesterday. It’s… She doesn’t have words. She - she needs to sleep. So she won’t go to class today, it seems. There’s no way in hell she can not sleep the entire day.

On the next day, she’s ready to go! This time, for real! Nothing's gonna bring her down!

Third time's the charm, and so she struts towards Hakuren’s football club with a resolute expression on her face. This time, no matter what happens, no matter if someone dies or if she breaks her leg or if a portal appears to take her back to her world (okay, maybe if that’s what happens she would make an exception), she won’t stray from her path. 

“...So, ready to go?” she hears Endou say, and looks towards where his voice is coming from. He’s standing on the door of a blue caravan, where all his team is sitting at, and extending a friendly hand towards… Shirou. Oh no, oh no, she knows where this is going. 

Shirou smiles placidly and takes Endou’s hand. “Yeah,” he says, and one foot steps inside the caravan. Nae’s stomach falls. Oh no oh no oh no, this can’t be happening, Shirou can’t be leaving Hakuren when he’s depressed and disappearing people are at large. He can’t be leaving—

“Where are you going?” asks Nae, who apparently approached them while she was having a mental crisis. Nice job, feet. Her voice sounds way, way more calm than she feels, but it’s nice, ‘cause if she sounded like she felt, she would break into intelligible crying and nobody wants that.

Shirou looks at her with a mildly surprised expression, one that’s like  _ why have never talked before why are you so concerned _ . She refuses to feel self-conscious. 

“Uh… yeah,” he says after a long stare-off. His smile is so still it’s very clearly fake. “Yeah, I’m joining Raimon.”  _ What’s it to you _ , he doesn’t say, but Nae hears it loud and clear anyway.

And, you see, Nae knows she can’t stop Shirou from going, from following after a challenge like the greedy boy he is, and she appreciates freedom enough to not even try. Instead, she turns towards Raimon’s coach, who’s staring at her but not really seeing her, and says, “Let me join the team, too.”

It’s a demand, not a plea, because she will be let into the team come rain or shine. Even if she has to hang into the back of the car and pray for her life all the way. There’s no way she won’t be there for Shirou if he needs her. Her Best Friend Duty won’t allow it (even if they aren’t best friends here).

Shirou blinks. Endou blinks. The entire team blinks. The coach purses her lips and says, “Why should I?”

It’s an obvious question. Nae should have expected it, but she didn’t, so it’s maybe with a little less composure and a little more indignation than what she should have that she answers, “I’m a great football player!” The best of Hakuren, she would have said, but she can’t because Shirou is here and he would contradict her. “I’ll be useful!”

The coach crosses her arms, unimpressed. Nae doesn’t want to admit it, because the coach is being rude, but the way her long black hair moves as she shifts her shoulders is very pretty. Regal, even. “Why haven’t I heard of you, then?”

The sky is very beautiful this morning, all clear and cloudless. Pretty, pretty — a perfect place for her eyes to look at, instead of the coach’s face. “Welllll…” She drags the  _ l _ to its maximum length, just to stall. When no idea comes to her, she snaps, “Who cares about that! Test me if you don’t believe me! I promise I’ll meet your expectations!” Whoops, too rude? “Pretty please with a cherry on top!” There, fixed.

The coach stares at her for a long, long time, and for a second, Nae’s sure she’s going to say something like  _ we don’t have time to lose so tough luck, look for another team  _ and then Nae would have to run after them and it would be a pain and, honestly, pretty tiring. Fortunately, she’s wrong, and when the coach opens her mouth, it’s to say, with a sigh, “Okay, then. I’ll test you.”

“Eh? Really?” She tilts her head.

Another sigh. “Really.”

“Yay!”

But now, with a football at her feet and an entire team in front of her, Nae has a problem. A very, very big problem, which is, at the same time, a very, very big question: does she still remember how to play football? 

Okay, she has more questions than that: Has this body played it before? How long has it been since she stopped running? Apparently, she has a whole new life here, so did she ever take it up in the first place? If she kicks the ball, will it go out of control like when she started? Not that it took too much time to get the hang of it, but she literally has a minute to score a goal or do something impressive here, and that’s too fast to become a pro, even for her.

She puts a foot atop of the ball, gulping, and rolls it around a bit, to get a feel for it. Okay, it seems normal, but who knows what will happen when she finally kicks the ball. This is an all or nothing, and, while she won’t allow life to stop her if she fails, this’ll certainly put a big wrench in everything.

She glances up at the team. Eleven vs. one is a bit of an overkill, but when they smile reassuringly at her, once they notice her eyes, it fills her with reassurance. She looks at the ball again and breathes deeply — in, out, in, out — until she’s ready to go. Only, she’s not ready to go until she’s clapped her face as hard as she can, so she does just that, and laughs a little at Someoka’s surprised yelp.

The coach (Hitomiko, according to Endou) clears her throat, dragging Nae’s eyes towards her. She’s raising an eyebrow in such an elegant way it makes her kind of jealous. “Ready?” The condescension in her voice is palpable, and Nae  _ burns _ .

She nods, eyes resolutely settled on the team once again. “Yes.”

“Well, then…” A dramatic pause. “Go!”

Nae runs. A grin worms its way into her face as she kicks the ball in between the forwards, dashes among the midfielders and stares down at the defenders, too fast for anyone to catch her. A cloud of dust raises where she steps. Heh. Good to see she’s still got her awesome football abilities! And her speed! And everything!

As Nae moves to dribble Kazemaru, who’s looking at her with single-minded intensity, she kicks the ball a little too weakly, and she steps on it. Before she has time to wonder where her gravity center has gone to, she’s eating dirt and certainly not enjoying it. A hand smacks into a face and someone stifles a laugh. Nae’s cheeks burn. 

What a rookie mistake.

Without even bothering to get up, she mutters. “Can I get a retry, please?” If this stupid tripping has cost her her chance at Raimon, she swears she will  _ scream _ . “Please, please, please.”

There’s a sigh coming from Hitomiko, and Nae raises her head enough to see her face. She’s pinching her nose with a  _ oh my god what have I gotten into  _ expression on her face: eyes tightly closed, lips twisted into a grimace. Nae doesn’t know if she should feel hopeful or despairing. 

“There’s no need,” Hitomiko says, and waves a hand dismissively and and a bit aggressively. “I’ve seen enough.” Nae’s heart falls, and so does her face. She’s just about to demand another try, her mind circling around all the words she could say, when Hitomiko continues, sighing again, “You’re in.”

Nae scrambles up, points at herself. “I’m in?”

“...Do you want me to withdraw the offer?”

“No!” she hurries to say. Hitomiko looks  _ serious _ . “No, no, no! I’m in.” The words make it real, and her mouth breaks into a huge grin and her cheeks hurt. She vibrates where she’s standing. “I’m in, I’m in!”

Someone claps her in the back — Endou, who apparently left the goal the moment she fell. “Welcome to the team, Shiratoya!”

“Pleased to be in it! Yeah!” She punches the air, one (“Yeah!”), two (“Yeah!”), three (“Yeah!”) times. When she’s about to go for the fourth, though, she stills. Completely stills. “Uh-oh…”

“What’s the matter?” Endou asks, frowning a little. 

“...I haven’t told my father. About… going to travel the country and all that. Whoops.”

She’s the worst daughter ever. The worst daughter ever! Who doesn’t notify their lonely, lovely parent about big things like these? And she hasn’t gone to see him since she landed in here! That should have been the first thing she did the moment she realised she had time-dimension-traveled! Tell her father!

The worst thing about this is that he’s going to let her go. He’s always given her what she wanted, even when it cost him. And it’ll cost him — it may cost him a daughter.  _ Maybe _ , she reflects, sadly,  _ it already has _ . She’s not this world’s Nae, after all.

“Go tell him now,” Hitomiko commands, voice tired. Nae mutters an agreement and hurries towards the nearest empty place (a corner between the dormitories and the first-year building).

She pulls out her phone, and dials in her dad’s number. With each unanswered ring, the tension in Nae’s body skyrockets. There’s no doubt in her mind that he’ll accept to let her go, but… she doesn’t want to ask it, to hear his poorly hidden disappointment.

On the fifth ring, her dad picks up. Nae holds her breath. Her lungs hurt. 

“What’s up, sweetheart?” he says, and Nae’s eyes itch. She wipes them with the sleeve of her uniform and frowns. Not now, Nae.

It’s just… She hasn’t realised how much she missed him until now, until she heard his sleepy, rough voice. She can imagine him, laid out in his bed, blinking blearily at the ceiling and wondering. He probably pulled an all-nighter at work. And he still picked up the phone when she called. 

“I love you, dad,” she blurts out, and sniffles. A tear slides by. Her cheek tingles. She refuses to break down.

“I - Nae? Are you okay?”

_ No _ , her mind says, and because this is her dad, “No.”

“...What happened, sweetie?” She smiles wetly, and blows her nose. It’s so obvious he’s restraining his alarm to make her feel calmer. She has the best dad ever.

And now Nae has a choice: tell him or not. Except it’s not really a choice, because, again, this is her dad, and so she tells him. Everything. In excruciating detail. Even her iDOLM@STER poster. Everything. 

Her father hmms and ohs during the important parts, and, when she finishes, he says, lightly, “That’s certainly the start to an interesting week.”

She snickers — it’s a bit of an exaggerated reaction for such a bad joke, but her feelings are all wonky right now, so leave her alone. “Yeah, you can say that again.”

“That’s certainly the start to an interesting week.”

She grins. “You’re so silly, dad.”

There’s a comfortable silence, and Nae leans against the wall and waits until he’s finished mulling about everything. Her father may be a bit slow, but when he takes his time to think, you can be sure that something good will come out of it. And besides, she’s not in any hurry — okay, well, maybe she shouldn’t make her new team wait for her on her literal first minute with them, but, eh. It is what it is. Now that she’s cried, it’s difficult to care about things like that.

“...So you’re going with that Raimon team, aren’t you?” her dad says, after two minutes or so have passed in silence.

She exhales all the air trapped in her lungs in a breathy, “Yeah. I’m sorry. I’ll be careful.”

“I trust you to be,” he says without hesitation, and her heart clenches. Best. Dad. Ever. “Call me at least once a week, yes?”

“Once a day,” she promises, clutching her phone. There’s no way she’ll go a day without speaking to her father, her guilt would never leave her alone. “So, bye for now?”

His nod is somehow audible. “Bye for now. I love you, Nae.”

“Love you too, dad.”

And he hangs up. Nae presses the phone against her forehead for a long moment, breathing deeply. Then, she pockets it, claps her cheeks, and gets ready to go. Into an adventure!

The caravan sets off not too long after that. Nae sits in the back, with a silent Shirou, and watches as the homely snowy scenery drifts away, replaced by green fields and gigantic trees - and then, the caravan stops, and they’re in Kyoto.


	2. II: Kyoto

Even with all the tournaments she’s been in, Nae’s never been in Kyoto. As such, she can’t stop gawking at - at - everything. It’s all so traditional! 

Okay, maybe not everything — there are normal buildings, made of bricks and electricity, but it all has that aura of ancientness that she’s never felt so strongly before. Like, look at all those wood temples and calm lakes and cherry trees. And  _ oooooh _ , is that a geisha?

It’s probably better she stops staring at people. It’s rude. And she doesn’t say that because of the side eye the geisha’s thrown at her, of course not. Psssh. Who would let herself be influenced like that. Certainly not her.

She hears someone snicker when she yelps and averts her gaze from the angry geisha, but when she turns around, everybody is deep into their conversations. She shoots an angry look at everyone, just for the trouble.

The streets pass them by, and now that Nae doesn’t feel like watching her surroundings, she’s bored. So, obviously, she goes to speak to the person she’s here for, who conveniently is alone too. 

“Shirou!” She falls into step with him, beaming. “How’s your day going, man?”

Shirou blinks slowly at her, like she’s spoken too fast and his brain is too slow to catch it. She doesn’t want to compare his stare with a dead fish’s, but… well… let’s leave it at that. She throws him a rope and repeats herself, this time a little slower and with less energy. Only then do his eyes lit up with something. Wow, he must have really been absorbed in his thoughts.

“I’m fine,” he says, smiling placidly. 

He doesn’t ask about her, but that’s probably a social misstep (this Shirou seems to be pretty awkward, unlike hers. That one would die of mortification if he saw), so Nae continues pressing on. “Aren’t you dying of heat?” She fans herself with her hand. “I’m used to snow, not this!”

She  _ may  _ be exaggerating a bit — she doesn’t really like snow, not after… that, and she’s been out of Hokkaido plenty of times —, but hey, he doesn’t have to know that. A little lie is fine for the sake of entertainment, right? Right.

“I… don’t really like snow,” he answers, unknowingly echoing her thoughts. He tugs on his scarf. “It’s dangerous.”

Oh, man, the conversation has sure gotten heavy really fast. “It is, yeah…” she says, a bit wrong-footed. It’s not that she doesn’t agree (how could she not?), but it’s so sudden she doesn’t really know how to react. This speaking with Shirou business is more complicated than she expected.

She shakes her head. Time to take control of the conversation! She can’t let Shirou keep dominating, not with these kinds of topics. She grasps for something light. “So… football.” Yeah, that’s almost impossible to turn serious.

“Yes?”

“It’s great, right?”

“Er… Yeah.” He doesn’t say anything else. Not one anecdote or opinion or favourite team or favourite brand of trainers. In her world, Shirou would have smirked at her, and said something flirty or flattering — something like “Yes. Difficult not to love something when princesses like you are in it,” and she would have giggled and continued with it and -

(Nae! Stop thinking!)

“It is, it is!” She nods, nods, nods. “So… how long have you been playing?”

His hand is one again on his scarf. That’s a tic for something, but Nae is certainly not thinking, so she can’t deduce what that something is. “All my life,” he says, clipped. Going by his fake light tone, there’s some tragic backstory there, but he doesn’t go into it. Should she be relieved or disappointed? Well, she guesses it’s a bit too soon in their relationship to go around spewing secrets, but…

(Bad Nae! Don’t think!)

“Oh, I’ve just started to play—” Yesterday, technically, but she can’t say that. It’s too surrealistic. “—three years ago! Best decision of my life, actually.”

“Yeah…” He looks down, buries his mouth in his scarf. There’s a(nother, really?) silence. Just when Nae is about to give up this as a failed conversation and wander away to bug Someoka, he speaks. “Why didn’t you join Hakuren’s football club?”

The question isn’t accusative, just curious, but Nae feels caught anyways. Oh, man, she really should have thought about that — except she shouldn’t think. Shit, this is like that catch 22 thing, isn’t it? 

“Well,” she says, and pauses. What can she say? She doesn’t really feel like telling everything again, and Shirou doesn’t trust her enough yet to believe it. So, telling the truth is out, but she doesn’t like lying either. That’s not the basis of a sustainable relationship! And besides, what lie could she tell? I didn’t like your team enough to join? I didn’t feel confident enough to join a team? I don’t like socialising? No, no, and no! “...It’s complicated,” she ends up saying.

It’s the perfect answer: not a lie and not the truth, either. And Shirou doesn’t press, just “oh”s, so that makes it even better. Except in that it leaves them without a topic of conversation. Again. 

They step into an ancient temple, but Nae is too busy being frustrated to really notice its prettiness. Instead, she just narrows her eyes at Shirou and snaps, “What’s your favourite colour?”

He blinks. “...White?”

“You aren’t sure?” Okay, maybe she’s being a bit rude. That’s not the way to make friends, even if they have a frustrating lack of social skills. She smiles at him. “Sorry. Why was it a question?”

Shirou blinks again. “I-I am.” A pause. “Sorry, it caught me off-guard. Sorry.”

Nae sighs. She supposes she shouldn’t be so hard on a guy so socially awkward. How did he get to be the most popular guy of her class, anyways? She would ask, but it seems a bit rude, and she’s been rude enough for a day, let alone a conversation.

“You don’t need to apologise,” she says, and, just as they’re entering some temple, switches the topic to something hopefully more long-lasting. “So, how great is the Hakuren football team? Make me regret I didn’t join.”

And maybe this is shooting herself in the foot, but at least Shirou is saying long strings of words, no matter how many pauses there are in between. And Nae smiles and nods and asks the right questions in the right places, all the while burying the regret under lots of pride. Finally, Shirou is speaking! 

“Oh, and what did Ju - eh, Matoro-san do — AAAH!” Suddenly, the ground gives up on her and she goes down, breaking her neck and back and feet and body against the bottom. She straightens up, and her entire body protests to the movement. Calmly, she wipes her dirt-smeared uniform and looks up, to the faces of her teammates poking out of the rim. Then, she breathes iiiiiiin, ooooout, and says, “WHO PUT A DAMN HOLE IN HERE?!”

(Okay, she screeches*, but whatever.)

Someone roars in laughter, annoying, high-pitched “shi shi shi”s fill the air. Nae kicks the wall of the hole with single-minded determination, uncaring that some specks of dirt crumble to the floor. It’s sturdy enough, she won’t fall. And so she puts one foot on one wall and the other on the opposite, and, with that weird spargat, she starts to climb. Like in the movies. She’s a ninja. 

...When she’s halfway there, almost close enough to grasp the helping hands her teammates offer, she slides to the bottom, so slowly that it sure is a mockery from God. The “shi shi shi”s increase.

“You brat!” Nae shouts, shaking her fist at the sky. “Pray for your life, ‘cause when I catch you…”

“What will you do?” whoever is laughing says, and snickers some more. “You don’t seem very scary. Will you fall down another hole?”  _ Shi, shi, shi! _ he goes, the asshole.  _ Shi. Shi. Shi _ . As if he’s funny.

Her cheeks burn against her will. “Shut up!” 

“Help Nae-chan out in this instant!” Haruna, her saviour, snaps. Apparently, she  _ is _ scary — which, why? She’s smaller than Nae, and her face is rounder and softer and all in all unthreateninger — ‘cause the boy shuts up and, three seconds later, throws her a rope. A literal one.

“...Are you kidding me,” she says, because climbing a rope isn’t on her plans for today. Not that falling down a hole was, but you get what she means. “Is this a joke.”

“Maybe.” The Cheshire-cat grin is audible. He doesn’t throw her anything else, more useful, like - she doesn’t know - a rope ladder?  _ That _ would be great.

Nae eyes the object in question with dread. She’s never been the most graceful person in the world, but this is going to be humiliating. Sighing, she grabs it, and prepares for a long and painful death to her dignity.  _ Bye, bye, my love, _ she thinks, regretfully.  _ It was nice while you lasted _ .

Thirty seconds later, she’s standing on the floor, sweet floor. She kind of wants to kiss it, but refrains. Her pride had been salvaged in the rope climbing (turns out, the moment she grabbed the rope, her teammates pulled her up. She’s eternally grateful), so she shouldn’t lose it now, no matter how steady the ground feels.

After hopping a bit to settle, and then hopping a bit more ‘cause bunnies, her eyes zero on  _ him _ .  _ That _ boy. The one who caused all this nightmare. That’s right, _ that _ brat. Kogure Something-Something. In her time, the king of pranks, but never directed at her. At least, until now.

“How could you?” she snaps, pointing an accusing finger at him. He raises his hands placatingly and steps back as Nae steps forward, but the damn grin hasn’t wormed off his face. She grits her teeth together, and as she lowers her head, a lock of hair slides over her shoulder.. 

_ Shi, shi, shi _ s fall out of his lips. Nae scowls. “It was funny!” he says and—

—Nae can’t hold herself back. She  _ can’t _ . “I’ll give you funny, you piece of—”

“Nae-chan!” Aki says, fingers curling around Nae’s wrist to stop her from advancing. She’s pursing her lips disapprovingly and, though she’s thirteen and Nae’s mentally fifteen, it’s like a mother lecturing her daughter. In the background, Touko guffaws. At least, someone’s having fun (Kogure doesn’t count).

Nae pouts, and steps back again, chastised. “What? He deserves it!” 

Aki’s brow furrows. Her fingers don’t leave Nae’s wrist. “He just pulled a prank on you!”

“He should have pulled it on  _ you _ !” She puffs out her chest. “And then I would be the one insensitively telling you not to punch a brat!”

There’s a stare-off — Aki’s unyielding warm eyes against Nae’s mildly irritated ones. People are laughing but she can’t look away to see who the offenders are. Time stops for a minute, and everybody’s eyes pierce her (especially Hitomiko’s unreadable ones), tension to see who’ll win. One second passes. And another. And another. And another. And another. And another. And another.

And another.

And another. And another. And another. And another. And another. And another.

And then she yawns at the same time Aki snickers.

“Peace?” Aki extends a hand, a smile making her eyes twinkly. It hovers unhesitatingly in the space between them, waiting even when Nae stares at it for a moment too long. 

But only a moment. In the next, Nae’s already taken it with a grin, all irritation gone. Was this Aki’s plan since the beginning? To take some steam off her? If so, Nae shares a team with a genius. “Peace.”

Another hand lands on top of theirs. Without looking up, she  _ knows _ , down to her bones, who it belongs to. “ _ Kogure _ ,” she growls, glaring daggers at his hand. “Don’t. Interrupt.”

He points at himself, blinking with honest confusion. “How do you know my name? I haven’t introduced myself yet.”

...Whoops, what a fail. She doesn’t feel like explaining right now, either, so… “I don’t know, you just seem like a Kogure.” A flash of inspiration strikes her. That’s it, that’s his name! “Like a Kogure Yuuya, in fact. Am I right or am I not right? I’m right, right?”

Instantly, Kogure’s hand is gone from theirs, and he jumps back, like a cat scared of cucumbers. Crouching, his eyes are wide and his mouth is gaping.  _ Seriously _ gaping — she can see his uvula. Eugh. “Are - are you a seer?” he says, in a thin, high-pitched voice. It sounds as if someone is strangling him. “A spy? Have you been spying on me?”

She grins good-naturedly, and stops holding Aki’s hand to rest it against her hip. “Maybe.”

He narrows his eyes at her, but she knows he knows (she knows he knows she knows he knows) (heh) that he can’t press that statement without being the biggest hypocrite ever. So: check mate! That’ll teach him not to mock her!

After that, Hitomiko takes the rhythm of the conversation back to important matters, that is to say, football. 

So. 

Saginuma’s back, huh?

And Nae’s not playing. 

Cool.

_ Except _ it’s super not cool because she wants to play and Hitomiko won’t let her! No matter how much she asks, whines, pleads or begs, she maintains her position with stoicism and unreasonableness. 

“I want to speak with you,” Hitomiko says when Nae keeps insisting, in lieu of an answer. Nae frowns but doesn’t press anymore. That she wanted their conversation to be private is implied, and privacy has never brought good things along with it. It’s always  _ will you go out with me, Nae? _ or  _ You have failed your exam with the worst mark I’ve seen in my entire life, Nae _ or  _ I hate to tell you this, but your mother… she… _

A sudden and unwanted realisation strikes Nae. She won’t… throw her out of the team, will she? It’s too soon for Nae to have been useful, and Hitomiko knows it. Has to know it. She’s a coach and coaches are smart. Mostly. So she won’t throw her out. Can’t do that. It’s a stupid decision, and if that’s what they're going to talk about, Nae’ll tell them how stupid it is. 

Carefully, she asks, “What about?”

Hitomiko drags her gaze from Nae to the apparently ongoing match. When has it started? Has Nae been so absort in her thoughts? Wow. It’s been a long time since that’s happened to her, although she supposes these are trying times and she should excuse herself.

Wait, Hitomiko has started to talk. Listen, Nae; listen. “...How did you know Reize and Desarm’s name?” Nae tilts her head, pursing her lips in confusion. Who? Hitomiko sighs and specifies, “Midorikawa and Saginuma’s.”

And it’s as if time stops. 

This is a direct question — not at all like Kogure’s from before, where it was easy to escape with a joke. Here, she has to decide: does she lie or does she tell the truth and not be believed? Because she won’t be believed. Smart people only believe evidence, and she has none. 

But she doesn’t want to get caught in a web of lies, either. Nae’s never been a particularly honest person, but she’s never been a particularly lying one, either, and she doesn’t want that to change. Does she pass it off with a joke again, then? That may be enough to get her off the team, but then again, it may be not. 

...Nah. She better tell the truth. She shouldn’t go around making decisions for other people. Who knows, maybe Hitomiko’ll believe her. Maybe she’s that kind of smart people that know who to trust unconditionally; who believe in people, not in just evidence.

“Okay, this is kind of a long story,” she says. 

Hitomiko’s face doesn’t move an inch, but she still manages to look wry when she says, “I already guessed.” 

Nae smiles wryly and tells Hitomiko everything, not sparing any detail. It brings to mind how she didn’t want to tell the team the truth, earlier. Could it be that she trusts adults more than people her age? It would make sense, but it would also kinda not. She’s  _ fifteen _ (-slash-thirteen), shouldn’t she be trying to solve all the problems in the world just with the help of her friends and hiding everything from authority figures? In hindsight, this whole adventure seems a bit too supervised to be an adventure.

...Anyways. 

As was sadly predicted, Hitomiko doesn’t believe her. Her eyebrows rise judgmentally, and even though she doesn’t press or call her an idiot, disbelief radiates off her in big, gulping waves. Nae’s a bit sad, but not too much, because you can’t be disappointed if you kind of expected the result.

Hitomiko stares at her as if she were trying to see all the secrets her soul holds. Considering she has just told her, Nae feels entitled to press her lips together and drag her eyes towards the match, subtly (or maybe not) ignoring her.

This turns out to be a bad decision, as she lays her eyes upon fallen soldiers in a battleground. ...Okay, that’s a bit too extreme, even for the situation. She looks at her teammates laying on the floor with varying injuries on them. Concretely, she looks at Shirou, who’s barely staying on his feet and staring at the opposing team with a conflicted expression — fear, and trepidation. Oh, and he has orange eyes again, but that seems to happen a lot with him. 

They’re losing but, if you compare it with what it looks like when you see the players, not by much. Honestly, a simple 2-0 doesn’t deserve this presentation. Maybe these Raimon players are  _ that _ dramatic. 

... _Although_ , she reflects, glancing from the corner of her eye at Saginuma and his team, _not as much as them._ _Not nearly as much as them, with their tacky clothes and evil smiles and ridiculousness in everything they do._ . 

The match ends not much later, and the score is the same, but a loss is a loss, nothing to cry about (unless it’s on an official tournament, in the finals, after having spent your last three years pouring blood, sweat and tears and - ) but the team is hurt enough that it pains them to walk, so that’s no good. 

Saginuma’s team vanishes after sprouting some dirty words, before Nae can call them some things. Not dirty things, because Nae is a very polite girl, but things they need to hear, such as “you rude people” and “meany”. But they are cowards, and so they flee, leaving Raimon licking their wounds (not literally, thank God) and planning for revenge. Okay, not revenge, because Raimon is one of those teams that’s too nice, but for a rematch.

Kogure joins their team ( :( ), and they metaphorically set sail to Osaka. It’s a few days away, so Nae has enough time to interact with Shirou and rediscover he’s in some serious need of cheering up. 

Apparently, Saginuma’s team’s goalkeeper, whatever his name, stopping his (Atsuya’s, but don’t think about that don’t think about that don’t think about that) shot wasn’t good for him, because now he’s not just sad, he’s nervous and unresting, and it’s driving her  _ nuts _ . 

Really, what does it matter that it was stopped? He’ll score next time, and even if he doesn’t, there are more good strikers in the team, like (cough cough) her. So he can depend on them. 

But because he’s a dummy, he doesn’t know that, and Nae can’t drop it on him out of the blue or it will have no effect, so she has to wait for the opportunity to appear. But that means Shirou is all sad and nervous in the meantime, and she can’t allow that. She has to do  _ something _ . 

And sadly, the only something that comes to her is asking. Asking Kogure - for help. Pulling a prank. Ugh. It’s physically painful to think about it. But, sadly, he’s funny, when his jokes aren’t attempting to assassinate her dignity. And funny people cheer other people up, at least in her experience. And true, Endou does that, too, but his kind of cheering up is, like, inspirational. Shirou needs to laugh. 

And so, she takes away her pride as if it were a cheap coat and she were a pompous rich woman complaining about how modern coats are so low quality, and approaches Kogure in one of the caravan’s stops. He’s alone (she’s waited for him to be; she doesn’t want this to be more embarrassing that it has to be), jotting something down in a worn-down notebook. 

He looks up, squints suspiciously, when he spots her, and she does the same, because she doesn’t want to be less petty than him. 

“Kogure,” she bites out. She moves her mouth to let her next words spill out, but they get stuck on her throat. Even her body is refusing to ask him for help, huh? She’s glad its so loyal.

(She feels someone staring at her nape, eyes piercing into her, but when she turns around, she doesn’t see anyone.  _ Huh _ , she thinks, _ weird _ . And that’s it about that thought.)

“Shiratoya,” he replies in a dismissive tone, and she gets the impression he would be staring at his nails if both his hands weren’t occupied (by the notebook and a pen). “What do you want?”

She exhales strongly through her nose, and counts backwards from ten. Ten, nine, eight, seven, five three one let’s ask already and stop longening this suffering. “I…” She can’t do it she can’t do it she can’t do it -

Kogure uncurls one finger from his pen just to make the  _ go on  _ movement as obnoxious as he can, she’s sure. “You?”

“I…”

“You?”

“I…”

“You?”

“I…”

Kogure’s eye twitches. “Just spit it out already!”

A grin makes its way into Nae’s face. She can’t stop it, it’s too strong, but she can dim it enough to not reduce her chances at Kogure accepting her proposition. “I…” She clears her throat. Clears it some more. “Need your help.”

He blinks and then: “Oh-ho-ho? Oh-ho-ho-ho? Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho? What’s this? Have I heard correctly? You need my help?  _ You _ need my help? I think I haven’t heard well — you’ll have to repeat it.”

Brat. And what’s with that self-satisfied grin, anyways? And the hand cupped around his ear? Does he think this is a joke? Does he think she would speak to him if this was a joke? (Well, technically, it is, but who cares about technicallys) But she can’t blow it up.  _ For Shirou _ , she reminds herself with a mental sigh, and repeats, “I. Need. Your. Help.”

“What for?” he says, and snickers. “And what makes you think I’m going to help you?”

_ Nothing _ , she thinks, but says, gravely, “This is about a prank.”

And that’s as if a switch has been turned: where before he was dismissive, rude and offensive, now he’s interested — maybe a bit too much, but she’s not going to complain if it’s to her advantage —, and it’s in his entire self. He’s leaning forward, his knees are pointing at her, and his eyes are piercing her up to her soul. She refuses to waver, but she kind of wants to. Those yellow eyes, settled entirely on her, are  _ scary _ .

“Go on,” he says. “I’m listening.”

This is like a job interview, and Nae’s forgotten her papers. Thankfully, she’s not anything if not a master of more-or-less improvising. “Well,” she begins, “you know Shirou, right? You know Shirou is always placidly smiling but it’s  _ obvious _ he’s depressed and sad and everything inside?”

Kogure raises his eyebrows. “Yeah? I know that. So?”

“Sooooo,” She drags the word until she has no air left, just to make this as slow and painful for Kogure as it is for her. “You’re a prankster. You make people laugh. Help me make him laugh.” Kogure stares at her for a long moment, without saying anything, and Nae twitches. She’s not self-conscious she’s not she’s not. “What?”

“You,” he begins, pointing at her, “want me,” pointing at himself, “to play a prank on your best friend.”

Her cheeks are sure hot right now, huh? What weird weather. “Pfffft, what? Best friend? I wouldn’t throw the word around so easily,” she says, quickly, and wow, what a beautiful tree, way more interesting and captivating than Kogure! 

“...Alright.”

He’s totally not convinced, but, well, as long as he doesn’t press. “A-anyways, yes, I want you to help me prank him. But a nice prank. Not a prank like the one you did to me the other day. Or the other pranks you did to me. I want a prank to make him laugh, not to make other people laugh. You know?”

“I do know…” he muses, rubbing his chin thoughtfully like they do in movies. Except he has a pen and it touches his face when he moves and decorates it. Nae doesn’t laugh. He’s too close to accepting her petition to blow it up with something like that. “Hmmmm…”

Pffffft, trying not to laugh is harder than it seems. “So…” She pauses to swallow a particularly strong peal of laughter. “D-do you accept? I’ll be your sidekick if you need it.”

He tilts his head, dropping his hand away from his chin in one movement. That means he leaves at plain sight all the scrawls the pen has left on him and - and -

“Yeah, I accept.”

\- and Nae bursts into laughter. Don’t blame her! If you could see Kogure’s face, you would laugh, too! Like, how can you maim your face that much with just a pen and a gesture? It should be illegal. Oh man. If this means he will retreat his acceptance… They will have some problems. Especially Kogure.  _ He _ will have some problems. 

“Hey!” Kogure screeches, pointing at her once again. His cheeks are a faint tint of red. “What’re you laughing about! Tell me!”

Nae sobers — well, kind of. Her lips won’t stop twitching no matter what she does, but at least she’s not outright laughing. “I’m sorry, it’s just…” She taps her chin with a nail.

Kogure’s hands fly to touch his chin, but he frowns, apparently thinking she’s lying just because he can’t feel pen ink with his fingers. Does he think he’s hyper sensitive or something? Does he think Nae’s a liar?

“You’ve got ink all over your face,” she elaborates, a bit miffed. She pulls her phone out of her pocket and takes a photo of him, wide-eyed and embarrassed. Showing it to him, she says, “See? ‘M not a liar.”

“Delete that photo!” he screams, dropping his notebook and pen and jumping into her to take the phone out of her hands. Instinctively, she raises her arm as high as she can, and Kogure, being a dwarf, doesn’t reach it, even if he jumps up to her face. “Delete it! Delete it!”

Nae’s grin is Cheshire’s. “Make me.”

Kogure glares at her, which would be scary, but right now Nae’s on an amusement high and it only serves to make her grin wider. And his cheeks are reddening by the second! Haha!

“Delete it.”

“No.”

“Delete it.”

“No.”

“Delete it or I won’t help you.”

Nae pouts. “Party pooper,” she says, but complies. In the next second, the amazing photo has disappeared, never to be seen again for the rest of the universe’s both eternal and ephemeral existence. Sigh. That would have been blackmail for all of Kogure’s life… which reminds her that she could have blackmailed Kogure to help her without deleting the photo. What a fail.

“Anyways,” Kogure says, eyes closed. The blush has started to recede from his cheeks, and she hates it. Flustered is a good — and more importantly,  _ funny _ — look on him. “The prank.”

Well, he’s helping her, so she supposes she should put the past behind her and be nice. Not that she’s ever not nice but, well. There’s a gradient, and right now she’s on the ruder part of it. With that in mind, she crouches and picks up the notebook (very hard to the touch — not brittle as it looked like!) and the pen and hands it to him. He blinks.

“Yeah,” she says. “The prank.”

There’s an awkward pause, but it only lasts a moment. In the next second, his eyes are shining and his lips are smiling, and she tugs on the sleeve of her Hakuren jacket (the only remnant of her school, now that she can’t wear its uniform) and drags her to sit on a rock. Once they’re there, he opens the notebook, full of drawings and far neater writing than she’s been expecting, and they start to plan. 

Shirou won’t know what hit him.

Except that, somehow, he does.

It doesn’t matter what they do or how original their prank is — no matter if it’s a traditional hole in the ground covered by leaves or something innovative, like managing to convince a circus’s ringmaster to lend them an elephant and trying to scare him with it — he doesn’t fall for it. It was Kabeyama who fell in the hole, and it was Kidou who saw the elephant and proceeded to have a heart-attack. Seriously, all of the team has been pranked in this spree except for their actual target.

They both agree on it: it’s infuriating. And they redouble their efforts, but nothing comes of it. By the time they’ve exhausted all the material in Kogure’s filled-to-the-brim notebook, half the team has been traumatized, and the other half is getting ready to murder them in their sleep. Only Shirou is peaceful, even when she slides in the seat next to him when they finally restart their travelling.

She melts into the soft cushions of the seat (for being a caravan from a public school, it’s impressive how many high-quality things it possesses; seriously, these seats are better than her sofa at home, and she’s upper class). It’s been a tiring two days. All the social interaction she’s had to make to get all the pranking material has been a new record for her, and she  _ is _ a social butterfly. 

Nae’s ready to let the rumbling of the caravan’s engine lull her to sleep, but there’s no way she can do that without some answers. And so she turns to look at Shirou, who shifts when he feels her eyes, and asks, “ _ How? _ ” with as much incredulity as she knows how to put into words.

Shirou smiles candidly at her, eyes alight with amusement and — well, at least their objective with all of this has been achieved. Shirou clearly had fun, watching them run around and fail to do things. Her lips twitch. The day’s been a success, then.

“Ah… Who knows.”

...Not that they should have made the effort, of course. This Shirou is as much of a little shit as she remembers hers being — maybe more, as he’s younger here. Nae doesn’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to maturity, but even with that, this is inexcusable. How  _ dare _ he not tell them, at least, how he’s been avoiding them?

She crosses her arms and pouts, resolutely stares out of the window and refuses to look at Shirou. He should tell her and be done with it! Now Nae won’t speak to him for the remainder of their lives and post-deaths!

But then, Hitomiko receives a call, something about an old rival team having turned evil or something, and they have to change their destination to Ehime. By the time they arrive, she’s already forgotten all about the unsuccessful prank spree.


	3. III: Ehime

A lot of things happen (...she thinks; she wasn’t paying a lot of attention), and then it turns out they have to infiltrate some place and kick some asses! Let it be said, Nae’s never been more ready for anything in her entire life. She wants to finally play football, and she has a feeling that Hitomiko’ll let her play in this match.

But before that, a totally secret infiltration. Sshh! Don’t tell anyone.

And because the walk is long and Shirou is occupied and she hasn’t spoken with Someoka since she arrived to the team, she goes to make some talk with the pink-haired forward she so very dearly loves. Not that he looks very enthused about it — he’s as gruffy and reluctant as she remembers.

“...What do you want,” he says when she approaches, and she smiles. At least, someone hasn’t changed personalities while she slept. Even if this Someoka is a little less confident, that’s because of his age, not his personality.

“I want to speak with you!” she says, sunnily, and bumps shoulders with him. He blinks at her, but at least he doesn’t flinch, wince or take a step back, so that means this Someoka likes her. Yay!

“Er…” He stares at her as if he’s seen an alien, and she puffs out her cheeks. Rude! “What about?”

“Dunno,” she says, and throws her arms behind her head. Maybe a more laid back position will help him feel less awkward? Because wow, was that  _ er… _ awkward. It physically pained her. “So… what’s your favourite colour?” 

Purple, she knows, but that was the first question that came to her mind and she didn’t want to create an awkward pause.

He stares at her for a long moment. “Purple.”

“You aren’t sure?” she asks, because it’s been a long time since she’s seen someone replying so slowly. And Someoka, in particular, isn’t the kind of person that is slow. He’s quick in everything — quick to anger, quick to smile, and quick to answer. (Quick. What a weird word, isn’t it? Sounds like quack.)

Another pause, but this time it’s shorter. “Yes, I’m sure.” He still looks like he wants to say something, so she patiently remains quiet and smiling. “What’s yours?”

Oh, he has ventured into the conversation! Nae’s so proud. “Pastel pink!” she says, grinning up at him. 

And that would be the end of the conversation, except Nae doesn’t want it to. The place they’re going to is still too far away, even if they’re jogging at a good speed and she wants to catch up with Someoka a little more. 

“Did you know people that like pink and people that like purple are destined to be friends forever? ‘Cause they are. And as we are apparently bonded by destiny, tell me about yourself more. So, um…” She grasps for the standard topic among her social circle: “football. When did you start to play football? You’re very good, so when you were a baby, right?”

This is a question she doesn’t know the answer to, so she’s pretty surprised when he says, scratching his neck, “In elementary school, but I didn’t practice too much there — didn’t even have a hissatsu. It wasn’t until Endou practically manhandled me to join Raimon, almost a year ago, that I started to take it seriously.”

“Wow,” leaves her mouth before she could stop it. Not that she’d wanted to stop it, because why wouldn’t she want to say something positive to someone? You shouldn’t be embarrassed of being nice! “What a year, then, if you have gone from nothing to being one of the best forwards of the country.” Of the part of the country that participated in the FF, but well. Same difference. She’s not going to be the one that takes away the merit.

“Yeah.” He looks at the sky (which today is dark and not at all homely. Bleh). “You could say it like that.”

Nae leans into his personal space, smirking in a teasing way. “Ohohohoho? I smell a story there. Tell me, tell me, tell me.”

Someoka takes his arm off his neck and drops it, hand in his pocket. Nae’s uniform doesn’t have pockets, and the other uniforms don’t have them either, so Someoka must have sown them himself. That detail is both intimate and cute, and it tugs out a real smile out of her smirk, which ruins the effect she was going for, but whatever.

He doesn’t seem too sure about telling her the story, so she needles him a little, complete with a nudge nudge and little wink wink.

With a little bit of effort, she convinces him, and he starts to tell the story about how he joined Raimon, how they trained, how they struggled, and how they won. 

By the time he’s narrating his match against Zeus, all the original team (which, apparently, is everyone but her, Shirou and Touko) has joined in, and is taking turns to tell the story. Don’t tell anyone, but Nae’s favourite narrator is Endou, with all the onomatopeias and exaggerated arm movements he does. 

Nae hums, ohs and claps, and sometimes asks questions. Touko wows, ahs, and gasps, and almost always asks questions. Shirou listens quietly and smiles. It all feels so mundane that, when they stop in front of a... submarine stadium (she’s not going to comment), she snaps back to reality, sudden, like a rubber band snapping back into position.

Stubbornly, Nae keeps talking with Someoka about unimportant, fun nothings — at least, until the match is about to start and Hitomiko tells everyone to shut up.

Okay, from what she’s gleaned and going on how shaken Kidou is, she can guess that someone, related to the people who has evilised the Aliea members, has also evilised some more people, who are Kidou’s friends?, and they’re going to play against them. And Kidou was from Teikoku and their rival team is called Shin Teikoku, so she knows who they are before she turns her head to check.

And yeah, there they are. Sakuma, Genda, and Fudou, and… no one else from Teikoku? Unless this universe has really changed the members, only three people match with the original team, so they shouldn’t be called Shin Teikoku. They should be called New Team or something shabby like that.

It’s honestly pretty creepy to see people she knows like this, feral and unhinged and raw in a way that people shouldn’t be. She’s never spoken to any of them personally and it’s kind of slightly scaring her — she doesn’t want to imagine how Kudou must be feeling, seeing his old friends like that. Especially when they start saying how it was his fault they are like that and blah blah blah. 

Yeah, they’re clearly brainwashed. Good friends don’t say those things, and from what she knows, Kudou only has good friends.

“Focus,” Hitomiko says sharply, and although she’s not looking at anyone, it’s clear she’s saying it to Nae, so she straightens up and smiles dutifully. Hitomiko clears her throat. “As I was saying, the forwards this time are Someoka and Shiratoya, with Shirou alternating between defense and offense as needed. The midfielders…”

Hitomiko keeps speaking, but Nae’s too excited to care. Finally! Playing! And with Someoka too! Since her first year at Hakuren, Someoka and she have been on opposite sides of the pitch, so this’ll be like a bath in nostalgia. ...Which maybe isn’t a great idea right now, but who cares. She’ll pull through.

This is so great she’s almost vibrating! What kind of double hissatsu will they develop in this match? Something like Dragon Princess? Or maybe Draconian Princess! Or - or! Serpentine Princess! All great names for the great (platonic) couple they make!

Someoka doesn’t seem as enthused as her, but she doesn’t take it personally, because there’s no way someone is more enthused than her with this arrangement. They’re going to rock, even if Someoka doubts her forwarding abilities thanks to her tripping that one time. But Hitomiko trusts in her, so she’ll prove him wrong. She’ll prove them all wrong!

Nae claps Someoka’s shoulder (once Hitomiko’s finished listing the players, of course, ‘cause she’s not suicidal) and grins. “We’re going to win, right, platonic partner?”

“...Right.”

She holds up her fist and looks expectantly at Someoka, who keeps staring at her as if she’s speaking in another language. Eventually, though, he caves and bumps his fist into hers with a sigh and a smile. She beams. 

The warning whistle — the one who tells them to get ready in their positions — blows, and they step into the pitch. Okay, it’s a bit more dramatic than what she’s narrating it as. Let her try again. From the beginning.

Someoka and Nae look into each other’s eyes, and she doesn’t know why, but the moment - it feels important. The whole world disappears under the weight of that dark gaze, of that sharp smirk. She sucks in a breath, mesmerised, and prepares for something. She doesn’t know what, but -

The warning whistle blows. 

Oh, yeah. The match. They’re about to start one, right now.

She trades one last look with her partner and nods resolutely. Then, she turns around, to face the pitch she’s about to go into, and starts taking little but determined steps towards it. She doesn’t let the other team’s glares and evil grins cower her — just raises her chin, and gets ready for the match, a match that is sure to be gruelling. 

One centimeter from the white line that separates the pitch from the non-pitch, she stops, looks and muses. 

This is it. The real start of her story in this world. She doesn’t know how long she’ll be here, but once she’s participated in a match, once she’s scored a goal, there’s no going back. This world will always be affected by her presence, however minimal it is. If she wants to back down, flee the team and make people forget her existence while she waits to come home, this is her last chance.

One last chance there’s no way she’ll take. Not while she’s herself, Shiratoya Nae, a girl always ready to rock. And as such, she takes a step into the pitch, and though her resolve wavers from time to time, it never breaks. Maybe she’ll have to leave this world tomorrow, or maybe next week, or maybe next year, but when that time comes… She will say that she’s had fun in here, that she’s lived life to the fullest.

…

Yeah, that’s a better description of what happened.

Anyways, she goes to the center of the pitch, along with Someoka, and finds herself very, very close to berserk Fudou and berserk Sakuma. The former smirks at her. “Think you can win against us, little girl?”

From the way it’s phrased, Nae would be driven to think that he’s being a little sexist, but that can’t be it. Fudou has always been the most regular respect-women juice drinker of all the boys she knows, and, let it be said, she knows a  _ lot  _ of boys. So he’s just trying to set her off and distract her, huh? It’s a technique he used to use (haha) quite a lot. 

“Yeah!” she says, grinning at him innocently. “We’re going to crush you! So good luck not dying in here!”

If she were with Shirou, he would have dug an elbow into her side. If she were with Atsuya, he would have laughed and added something cocky too. As of now, she’s with Someoka, who just smiles at her and bares his teeth at the rivals, and it looks so cool that Nae imitates him. 

Sakuma and Fudou stare. 

And then, the referee, apparently bored with their talk, blows the whistle, and Nae doesn’t waste any time in passing it to Someoka and running. Well, not running — she’s Shiratoya Nae, and she sprints without looking back! 

Buuuuut that turns out to be a bad decision. Apparently, she can’t play with Raimon as she does with Hakuren, because the moment she lifts her eyes off them, they’ve lost the ball, and she’s left on the rival side of the pitch alone and dumb. Heat rises to her cheeks, but she stubbornly pushes it down, and dashes back to Raimon’s side of the pitch to recover the ball.

Well, she tries to. But apparently, Shin Teikoku likes to mess with people, ‘cause she takes a step and there’s already a big guy stopping her.

“Er, hi,” she says eloquently. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I don’t have the ball, so. You can let me pass.”

“I’m sorry, missy,” the big guy says, and wow, he speaks like an old man, even though his smirk is pretty juvenile. Argh, she’s the one who sounds like an old woman here, man. Juvenile? What was  _ that _ . “Our captain told us not to let any forwards pass.”

“Oh.” She shifts her weight from one foot to another. “Well, that’s inconvenient.”

If this were something like free-style football, in this situation, she would kick this poor boy in the groin and run for it. But alas, free-style football doesn’t exist, she’s just seen a lot of movies, and so she’s stuck here, smiling at her enemy.

Tentatively, she takes a step to the left. The big guy follows her. She takes two steps right. The big guy does the same. Frowning, she steps forward, but the guy doesn’t move an inch, not even when she’s breathing into his chest. If she touches him, that’ll be a foul.

Ugh.

She gets on her tiptoes and falls back on her heels, sighing. It looks like she won’t get to do much until someone distracts the defense. Well, she’ll have to wait here, a poor damsel in distress, waiting for her horse-riding, football-kicking prince to arrive and free her from her captor—

She bursts into a sudden sprint, dashes past the big guy and all the rest of the defenses surrounding her. 

Yeah, right. She may be a princess, but not one who  _ waits _ — she acts. She’ll search for her monarch’s heir and drag them with her, be it lovey-dovey or kicking and screaming.

“You idiots!” Fudou says, scandalised, from Raimon’s side of the pitch. He’s following Kidou, who has the ball and is running towards her. “You couldn’t hold her up for one  _ minute _ ?”

“Sorry, Cap,” the big guy says, all contrite and surprisingly adorable for a group full of murderous preteens. Nae kind of wants to stop and watch, but she has to look for a spot where she’s unguarded and wait for Kidou to pass the ball and let her do something.

Fudou scoffs. “Whatever. Look for another person and  _ hold. Them. Down. _ ”

“Aye, aye, captain!”

And Nae grins, because that way of separating his syllables is super cute, but she doesn’t lower her guard. The match has just begun, and she has to do something if she wants to be a member worthy of this team. Not that she inherently isn’t but, well… kind of. 

The ball ends up at her feet while she is musing, and she blinks at it, before raising her head and blinking at the swarm of rival players running at her at break-neck speed. She blinks one more time, and then—

She screeches, sprints towards the goal. (With the ball in tow, because she won’t make that mistake again, it was embarrassing enough the first time.) She doesn’t know why she’s screeching, though. She’s way faster than them and they’re playing football, not murderball. Maybe it’s because they give off a pretty menacing aura. 

Well, the thing is that fear makes you stronger, or, in her case, faster, and so she ends in front of the goal in no time. And now, she has a split second to decide which hissatsu to use. She can’t do Triple Blizzard without— 

—so that leaves Rabbit Run. This body probably hasn’t done any hissatsu before but, well, she has to try. 

And so, she kicks the ball, does a backflip (wow, it feels weird), gets into a running starting position and  _ kicks _ . Again. 

“RABBIT RUN!”

Cute, cute, cute rabbits explode out and dash towards the goal along with the ball, and she smiles. So hissatsus really are in the soul rather than the body, huh? Cool! Weird, because she had to practice a lot last time to get a backflip right, but cool. 

But then Genda grins, feral and wild and very, very unlike him, and with a pretty painful-looking hissatsu (seriously, look at the strength his fingers have to do, at the worn marks in the fingertips after using it, the gloves having been unused before), stops it without much sweat.

Nae glares, but not too hotly, ‘cause she’s not a bad loser. That spot is exclusive for Atsu— Yeah. Not for her. For another person. Haha. 

In the background, Kidou says something about that hissatsu being dangerous or something, which - great. Exactly what one developing player needs: to ruin his hands forever. What’s made him resort to this? Isn’t it better to lose than to win and not be able to play? Nae, for one, would prefer to lose every match she played, even if it hurt. 

Anyways, Genda passes the ball to one member of his team and the match restarts. She stays on Shin Teikoku’s side of the pitch, waiting for Raimon to get the ball from them and pass it to her. 

But you know what that idea is? A mistake, mistake, mistake. Sakuma gets the ball and scores with another self-harming hissatsu, and that means Raimon’s losing and she hasn’t gotten to do anything important.

There’s a bit of a pause while the team returns to their positions, and of course she manages to cross paths with Fudou. 

He smirks, gazes at her as if she were a particularly dumb bug. Meanie. “Going to crush us, huh?”

“Shut up!” Nae snaps, and pouts. She refuses to let her cheeks heat up, because— “The match’s just begun, and we’re still going to win!”

Fudou doesn’t say anything, but the  _ yeah, right, you wish _ is clear in the shine of his dark eyes, in the tilt to his mouth, in the curve of his eyebrow. She’s always wanted to be  _ that  _ expressive with that little of face movement.

The match starts again, and Nae finds herself in the middle of the pitch, bored out of her mind. As a forward, her duty is to be around here and trust in her team to pass her the ball, unless some instinct compels her to venture into her side, but - maybe that’s different, here in Raimon. Maybe everyone here is a libero in everything but name, and she’s doing it wrong? Should she go with the defense and try to steal the ball from Sakuma?

But thinking doesn’t do much in a match of actions. She trusts in Raimon — has to trust in them — so she’ll wait here for someone to pass her the ball. And sure and soon enough, Raimon gets the ball from Shin Teikoku and passes it to Shirou and—

A white figure dashes past her.  _ Atsuya! _ , her traitorous mind says, even though that’s stupid. Atsuya’s not here. Shirou is, and Shirou is the one who’s running with that - that smirk and that pointy hair and those eyes, glinting with confidence and a thirst for winning. 

Something squeezes her heart.

Without really thinking about it, one foot after the other, she starts running after him. Her hand doesn’t reach out, but only because that would ruin her running posture, and she needs speed if she wants to reach someone as fast as - Shirou is. Yeah,  _ Shirou  _ (Shirou, Shirou, Shirou, Shirou; c’mon, mind. Learn it!) is very, very fast.

He dribbles past the midfielders, making it look like it’s the easiest thing ever, even though it’s really, really not. It’s only on those curves that he makes with his body that she can glimpse his arrogant smirk or his shiny eyes again. But just for a moment. Then it’s all just the back of his body and the back of his hair again.

She speeds up.

The defenses are another story. Big guy seems more serious, after failing to watch her, and now he’s smirking down at  _ Shirou _ , and though there’s too much noise around her to hear him, she can imagine the words his lips are mouthing. 

“You won’t pass,” the big guy probably says. “Prepare to lose a leg.” Rude. Playing with fouls is very, extremely, absolutely dirty and unfun. She retires every good thing she ever thought about him.

Shirou tries to move left, move right, move forwards, move backwards, but he’s surrounded, and the circle’s closing into him. Nae’s close enough now to see his grimace. His eyes are still glinting. 

Shirou, Shirou, Shirou, Shirou, “Shirou! Pass, pass!” She waves her hand for good measure, to make sure that dumb boy spots her. He does, in three seconds (a bit too slow for a match, but she’s in his blind spot, so she’ll let it slide for now), and his eyes widen a bit. Why, she can’t fathom, but well, he’s always been a bit weird, especially in this dimension.

His (orange) eyes narrow, give her a once over, and - okay. She’ll roll with whatever he’s thinking. She mouths exactly that to him, very exaggeratedly so he gets it clearly. He does, and she almost laughs, because a metaphorical lit light bulb appears above his head so obviously it’s almost literal.

She doesn’t laugh, but only because Shirou Eternal-Blizzards and, flying past the defenders, who make the smart decision of jumping ship, the ball approaches — not the goal, but  _ her _ . She’s never been on the receiving end of that particular hissatsu, but she’s seen it break nets, so she’s not eager to try that experience. Apparently, it’s not her decision, because the ball eats distance like she eats bunny documentaries, and there’s maybe three seconds before she gets a mouthful of pain.

She uses those three seconds not to move, but to look at Shirou, wide-eyed, like a precious little bunny in the headlights. Shirou’s thumb jerks towards the goal, a grimacey smirk on his face, and - okay, she thinks she’s got it. Maybe. She prays she’s got it, because she has only half a second left, and she can’t stop to think about that thumb’s deeper meaning over tea.

Okay, Nae, you can do it! Here we go. 

Taking a big gulp of air, she does the backflip and goes into a starting running position again, just in time to burst into movement. She sprints, her hair flying back as her body leans forward. Slams her foot on the ball. Ignores her ankle screaming at the sudden force. Shouts “RABBIT RUN COMBINED WITH ETERNAL BLIZZARD!” (They have to work on the name.) 

The shot, a ball leaving behind white aura followed by bunnies, cuts through the air as if it’s butter. Well. Maybe air is easier to cut through than butter, because butter would probably slow that ball down and air isn’t even nicking speed. One second it’s next to her, and the other it’s piercing through the net, boring a hole into the wall.

Silence. And then—

—cheering.

“Yay! Yay! Yay!” Combining hissatsus is difficult even with practice, so having managed it on the first try— “Yay! Yay! We’re a perfect combo, Shirou!”

Shirou, now with grey eyes, just smiles at her.

“NICE BALL!”

“What a shoot!”

“I should’ve never doubted you!”

“Hey,” Nae says, pouting. She stops her bunny dance to spin around and look at everyone’s faces. “Who doubted me?”

Someoka claps her in the back, claps Shirou, who has apparently approached her while she was distracted. He’s grinning a lopsided grin down at them (why is he so tall). A shit-eating grin. “I’m so proud of you, my students.” 

“Students?” they ask at the same time. They even blink at the same time! “Who said we’re your students?” she adds.

“I’m your senpai,” he answers, and doesn’t elaborate. O… kay? She’s never agreed to this, but she’ll let him have the satisfaction.

“Okay, then, Someoka-sensei, Shiratoya-chan,” Shirou says, with that placid smile of his. And hey, that’s what she was about to say! Cheater. “Let’s make an effort to pull the match to our side, right?”

Nae punches the air above her head. “Right!” she cheers, and then lowers her fist and blinks. “But call me Nae.”

“Okay… Nae-san.” Eh, she’ll roll with it.

Once again, she punches the air above her head. “Right!”

But Someoka doesn’t get the chance to make an effort. One moment he’s with them, and the other, he’s on the floor, clutching his leg and screaming. Kidou hurries past everyone, to him, and screams too. No matter how much she wants to do the same, Nae’s feet are firmly rooted to the floor, her eyes boring into Someoka’s pain-riddled face. Her chest is heavy, her stomach is burning.

“So the poor little forward can’t get up. Tragic.”

As one, everybody’s gazes slam into one smirking Fudou. There’s silence. Even Someoka’s stopped screaming.

Tension.

Ats - ...orange-eyed Shirou takes a step forward, lips curling into a sneer. His fists are clenched so tight that she wouldn’t be surprised to see blood flowing through his fingers. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Fudou raises his arms placatingly, but the expression on his face is nothing but. “Me?” he says, as if the thought he’s done anything wrong is inconceivable. “I was just playing football. It was an  _ accident _ .”

“I’ll show you accident, you—”

Someoka (when has he gotten up? Should he be getting up? Even if he’s standing on one leg, it may be dangerous) catches Shirou’s wrist, just as the fist attached to it is about to connect with Fudou’s gradually cockier smirk.

“No, don’t stop him! Let him ruin his football career because of an unjustified tantrum!”

Nae moves without thinking. 

“It’s not worth it. Fubuki,” Someoka is saying, just as Nae reaches Fudou and slaps him. A sharp noise rings through the stadium. “Shiratoya?!”

“Call me Nae,” she corrects absently, eyes not leaving Fudou’s unreadable face. The cheek she slapped is reddening, but he cups a hand around it — without lifting his dark eyes off her, either. Nae’s been on a lot of staring battles, but this is certainly the most tense.

“Oh, so someone has joined the party! You Raimon are pretty eager to ruin yourselves, aren’t you? Do you know what could happen to you now that you’ve hit me?”

She’s not scared of tension.

Shin Teikoku look like they want to punch her too, and the Raimon members are gazing at the conflict with varying expressions of dread. Hitomiko’s eyes burn into Nae’s nape. Nobody stops the silence from forming, from coiling around them and dropping the atmosphere even more. That’s great, because Nae wants to say something, and she wants Fudou to listen to it without interruption. 

“Look, man,” she begins, hands resting on her hips. “You’re the one who’s ruining his life here! Like, baiting us so we punch you? What if we did serious damage, huh? Is removing players from the opposing team worth your health?” One of her hands swings out to gesture at Someoka. “Is winning the match worth others’ health?”

He purses his lips. “...Yes.”

“Then you’re stupid!” she snaps, stepping closer to him and leaning into his personal space. He doesn’t lean back, but that’s probably because of pride, not because he doesn’t want to. Great. She hopes he’s uncomfortable. “I get that this is an important match, but man, first things first! Football isn’t football if you violate its rules, and even if it were, there are things more important than it! Like people!”

“If you can speak like that, then clearly you haven’t—”

“You don’t know what I have and haven’t gone through, so shut up!” She digs a finger on his chest. Her nails are long, so it probably hurts. Good. “And besides, my experiences don’t invalidate my arguments!”

He scowls. “ Arguments? What arguments? You’ve just been sprouting your ideals as if they’re some  _ objective truth _ —”

“—Because they are! They’re common sense! You should care about other people more - more than some stupid ball game!”

“ _ Stupid _ ? I remind you that you’re also playing it, and against dangerous opponents too! If you didn’t want to get hurt, you shouldn’t be playing against a team led by Kageyama fucking  _ Reiji _ —”

“I don’t know who that is, but—”

“Stop interrupting me! I’m trying to teach you real common sense here—”

“Common sense?  _ Common sense _ ?! Common sense isn’t hurting—”

“Well, who slapped who here, huh?”

Nae falters. “That - that’s because—”

“ _ Enough _ .” 

Hitomiko’s sharp, clipped voice rumbles through the stadium as she struts towards them, leaving another silence in its wake. Her eyes, cutting and cold, lay on Nae, and she winces, but doesn’t look away. Maybe this will mean her expulsion from the team, but there are times in which you have to fight for what you believe in, and this was one of those.

Fudou is smirking, now that she has gotten in trouble, and she’s kind of tempted to slap him again. But she won’t, ‘cause once was probably justified, but twice isn’t, and no matter what he implies, she’s not unreasonable.

This time, there’s not a battle of stares, because apparently Hitomiko is too old for that. Nae also feels a bit too old for that, but since when has she cared about age-behaviour expectations?

“Shiratoya,” she says, and Nae tilts her head. “To the bench. You’re not playing anymore in this match. Someoka, you too. We’re going to put some ice in that leg.”

They both nod, expressionless, even as Nae’s heart swells in relief.  _ In this match _ . That means she’ll be playing again in the future! Thank God. 

And wait — why is Someoka still standing? He injured his leg! He should have sat up again the moment he stopped Shirou from punching Fudou, shouldn’t have stopped him in the first place. She sighs. Football-obsessed preteens: so irresponsible.

She tells him and is rewarded with a mildly incredulous stare. Her shoulders rise to her ears. What? Does she have something on her face? Touching it would be a little embarrassing, but she does it anyways, ‘cause if she’d left embarrassment stop her, she wouldn’t be in this team.

And nope, she doesn’t have anything. Unless Kogure has drawn something (again), in which case there’s going to be a corpse by morning.

She plops her butt on the bench, and sticks her tongue out at Fudou every time he looks her way. He doesn’t do that often, because he’s an ungrateful ass (seriously, she lets herself be baited and he doesn’t have the mind to thank her?), but when he does, she enjoys his irritated expression.

“So,” Someoka says, and she side-eyes him, tongue still out, “common sense.”

The tips of her ears burn, and she determinedly focuses her eyes on the match. Genda has just stopped another goal, and Kidou is shouting at him about hurting himself. Her tongue retreats to her mouth once again to mutter, “Shut up.”

“That’s no way to speak to your sensei.” Ugh, the teasing, big grin is  _ audible _ . Why does she have to be its target? Tell her, universe: has she done anything wrong?

She puts her elbows on her thighs just to put her head in her hands, so that her slightly warm cheeks aren’t visible. She puffs them. Curse her white skin and her easily visible blushes. Someoka has discovered her weakness way too soon (last time, he discovered it in the middle of her third year), and he won’t let go. 

“Shut up… Someoka-senpai.”

Someoka has to leave the team, and Nae is sad, but not as sad as Shirou, who is sulking in a corner of the caravan.

She finds that she doesn’t have much to say to him — she is still sad, after all, and isn’t in the mood to come up with something cheerful. That’s what Endou is for, but Endou is also busy being sad. Smiley-sad, but whatever. And because the team’s moodmaker is sad, everybody is a bit sad, too — and wow, the word sad is starting to sound a little weird. Sad, sad, sad.

Anyways.

She doesn’t know what to say to Shirou, so she doesn’t say anything. She just - takes the seat next to him, forces a smile when he looks at her, and blinks when he smiles a little too. 

They travel in silence.


	4. IV: Osaka

Two days of travel, and they arrive at Osaka, ready to look for some Aliea facility. 

Apparently, in this dimension, Aliea is an organisation of aliens (?) that are trying to destroy Earth football, Kogure had informed her incredulously (“How can you not know what this team is for?! You've been here longer than me and—”). It’s pretty weird, considering Midorikawa and Saginuma and their teams were clearly not aliens in her dimension. She doesn’t know if this is one of the things that change from world to world, or… 

Or.

Well, she’s informed (maybe) now, and ready to look for that Aliea whatever. She doesn’t know exactly what they’re looking for, but nobody in the team really does, so that’s okay. This time, it’s not her problem. 

She’s not too enthusiastic about it, honestly, but then they arrive in Osaka, and it turns out they have to search in an — dramatic drumroll — amusement park!

The moment they step out of the caravan, she grabs Shirou’s hand and drags him away from the team. She waves cheerfully to them with her free hand, as they become a dot in the distance. “See ya later!” And then, she turns to Shirou. “I want to ride that roller coaster. You?”

He blinks at her, slowly. She really hopes he’s not thinking something along the lines of  _ But we have to fulfill our Duty™, we can’t slack off! _ , because then she’ll be very, very disappointed with his unfunness. Live a life, hypothetical Shirou. Live a life.

Fortunately (for him), he doesn’t say that. He says, lips twitching a little, “I prefer the ferris wheel.”

“Okay!” She raises their joint hands, and struts towards that attraction, a woman on a mission. “Then, we’ll ride both of them. Twice. Because to look for a faculty we have to observe carefully every part of it, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, and then he sobers a little.”But after that, we have to look for real, okay?”

Nae waves her hand dismissively. “Yeah, yeah.” She knows. She’s not that irresponsible, no matter what he might think. 

And so they ride the ferris wheel, and then the roller coaster, and then the ferris wheel, and then the roller coaster, and then, because Shirou pulled out his rebel side, they ride a drop tower.  _ That _ one isn’t exactly an agreeable experience, no matter what Shirou says. 

Nae’s legs are trembling when she touches the floor (she’s kind of tempted to kiss it). Tearfully, she looks up at Shirou when she hears him chuckle. That reckless, suicidal person apparently has enjoyed the attraction, and now laughs at the terror experienced by normal people. She’s kind of tempted to challenge him to a best out of three and ride the drop tower two more times, but. She doesn’t want to die, and, besides, they’re here on a mission. They can’t slack off  _ that  _ much.

( _ Excuses, excuses _ , her traitorous mind says, because she knows Shirou would win no matter how many times they rode the damn tower. 

She ignores it.)

They look around for something that screams  _ Alien! _ , but no dice. It appears these quote-unquote aliens are masters of disguise. Alas! They should look on the top of the roller coaster again, just… to make sure it’s not there. Yeah. 

Just when she’s about to suggest it to Shirou, who seems as bored as she is with this fruitless search, Megane comes running (if something of that speed could be called running) and panting and tells them that their search objective has changed. Forget about aliens! Now, they have to look for their wayward teammate. Ichinose is nowhere to be found.

Megane runs off again before any of them have time to ask him for details, presumedly to notify the rest about this development. Nae’s eyes drift to Shirou, and oh - he’s already looking at her, a placid smile on his face.

“Let’s look if he’s on the top of the roller coaster!” she suggests, grinning at him.

His smile twitches a little — hopefully, an attempt to become a little less a façade, a little more real —, but he shakes his head. “I think there’s a bigger chance that he’s on the top of the ferris wheel.” Nae pouts. He chuckles. “But, seriously, let’s ask someone.”

Nae rolls her eyes. “Oh, yeah. Ask. ‘Hey, girl. Have you seen a boy with brown eyes, brown hair, medium height, and short hair?’ Oh, I don’t know — I can see at least three boys like that from here. You’re going to have to be a little more specific.”

He punches her in the shoulder, and then blinks at his hand, eyebrows knitting a little. Nae waits until the weird moment passes, and he’s smiling like nothing has happened. She’s happy to pretend with him. 

“Don’t be sarcastic,” he says, hand dropping to its natural position. “Watch.”

And then he approaches two poor girls and proceeds to flirt with them to the infinite and beyond. Okay, maybe not flirt. He just smiles at them and asks politely and they seem happy to infer the rest. Still, one second he’s with her, and the other he’s looping an arm around each girl’s shoulders, and being dragged away to where Ichinose is supposed to be.

Nae blinks, and shakes her head. Shirou has always been popular with girls, but… she hadn’t really expected him to weaponize it. Not that it’s not useful, but. Still. She’s not like those girls, isn’t she? She’s certainly not infatuated by that guy (she’s seen it do too many embarrassing things for her to be), so there’s no danger. 

Right?

_ Stop questioning yourself, Nae!, _ her mind says. _ He’s not manipulating you! Now, go after him before you lose him in the crowd! _

She does — goes after him, that is. But she doesn’t approach him, because how would those girls take a pretty girl approaching a pretty boy? They would think they’re being cheated on (despite not dating Shirou themselves), and they would stomp away and that would mean they lost their way of finding Ichinose.

And so, she leaves a healthy distance between them as she follows. 

They end up in front of the door of some bar, where, through the window, they see a blue-haired fashionable girl is hugging Ichinose’s soul out of his body. Ohohoho? Has that boy gone and gotten himself a girlfriend? He didn’t seem like the type.

After a bit more inspection, it’s clear that the inverse happened here. That girl is too overbearing to be chased after, and Ichinose — well, he didn’t seem like the type because he’s not the type, if you go by the tension of his shoulders and the rigidness of his posture. 

She exchanges brief glances with Shirou. Wordlessly, it’s decided: Shirou will go call the rest of the team here, and Nae will use her girly girl skills to avoid the blue-haired girl squeezing Ichinose to death. He better thank her, because this girl is a tornado.

The bell of the door rings as she enters, and the lovey-dovey couple’s eyes snap to her. She swallows — the girl’s are ravenously hungry, and they’re threatening Nae as if she’s going to steal her food. ...Maybe that’s not a flattering metaphor for Ichinose, but eh, she’s a football player, not a poet.

“Who are you?” the girl asks, hugging Ichinose tighter if that’s possible (Ichinose’s eyes scream  _ HELP ME! _ , all caps), and - politeness? Hello? Have you gotten lost among these prepubescent brats? 

Nae won’t stoop that low. She smiles and waves, but doesn’t ask for a handshake, because she’s not a saint. “Hi! I’m Shiratoya Nae! Nice to meetcha! What’s your name?”

The girl examines her, from feet to face, squinting. What she sees must satisfy her (in probably an unflattering way), because, the next second, she’s opening her mouth to say, “Urabe Rika.”

And just when it looks like they’re making progress, Rika moves so that her entire body is in front of Ichinose, as if she’s shielding him from an upcoming bullet. Ichinose lets out a pitiful noise — she must be hugging too hard. Poor boy. He won’t get out of there unless Nae gets physical, and Nae never gets physical, the thing with Fudou notwithstanding.

Okay, she may have a way to try and defuse the situation. Let’s try it. 

“I’m not interested in him that way,” Nae says, crossing her arms and pouting. She’s a bit offended by the thought. Does he seem like her type? No offense, Ichinose, but she likes them a bit more… striking. “So your way is clear here. Don’t worry, yes?”

Ichinose lets out a pitiful, deeply betrayed noise. Nae very carefully doesn’t look at him; she doesn’t need puppy eyes on her morning. 

Rika squints at her some more, and finally, after what feels like the longest ten seconds ever, she grins. “Nice! Nice to meet you too, then!” She sticks one hand out and Nae shakes it, grinning herself. Now that they have gotten over this first hurdle, this friendship will be a lot smoother in the future!

“Shiratoya, please… Help me...” Ichinose whines, sounding as if he’s drowning (she still hasn’t looked at him, so she guesses Rika could be squeezing the life out of him), and oh, right — she’s here for him, not to make friends. Well, she’s already made friends, so. Bad luck, Ichinose.

Okay, maybe she’s being a bit harsh on the boy. She’ll help him out.

“So, Rika, to celebrate our undying friendship — do you wanna go eat something?” Nae pats her belly. “I’m starving, and you seem like the type that knows the best places.” Rika’s eyes flicker between her and Ichinose, so she decides to give it a little push. “C’mon! You can bring him too!”

Ichinose’s arm (the only thing in her stubborn vision) stiffens even more, if that’s possible. Heh, shows her he doesn’t know anything. Doesn’t he know that if Rika’s eating, she can’t hold him? Hmph. Noob. Illogical boy. Thoughtless baby.

Just in that moment, the doorbell rings as thousands of feet enter the bar and — oh, yeah. Technically, she had to wait here for the team to arrive. Haha. Funny how she almost didn’t. Anyways, she’ll pretend the last conversation didn’t happen, and that she’s still a responsible person who doesn’t forget what she has to do in the span of five minutes.

After that, some things happen, and then some other things, and then some other  _ other _ things, and now they’re here! Playing a match against Rika’s team — who, by the way, wears a really pretty uniform. Those are Nae’s colours, unlike Raimon’s yellow and blue. They contrast uglily with her hair. Maybe if she asks politely, Raimon will let her change their identity…

Nae’s playing this time, because apparently Hitomiko has forgiven her for getting a red card on her first match ever. She’s a forward, along with Shirou, which, okay. He’s a defender, but okay. Hitomiko knows what she’s doing, even if she’s probably maybe stealing Shirou’s identity as a football player.

The match itself is fun. She gets the chance to speak with her opponents while the ball is on the other side of the pitch, and in between hissatsus, and in between goals. By the time the match is finished (Raimon wins), she’s been invited to three separate pajama parties, and she plans on going to them all.

Making friends: what a nice pastime.

Raimon, especially Ichinose, seems a bit disturbed with her social-butterfly-ness, but eh, they’ll get used to it. Probably. Hopefully she will make more friends, although with the kind of teams they’re facing… She doesn’t want to be friends with  _ Fudou _ , not after that last match.

Anyways.

Apparently, the Aliea facility isn’t Aliea, but it is a facility, and so Hitomiko makes it work. With ‘facility’, Nae means that it’s a training center, kind of like the one Norika told her about once, in which their coach almost killed them. That story used to be funny, but now that Nae’s living the dream (nightmare, more like), she’s not laughing anymore. And that’s without there being a risk of death, because Hitomiko is a responsible adult, unlike Inakuni’s coach.

Her entire body hurts: head, shoulders, knees and toes, and eyes and ears and mouth and a nose — Er, yeah. Everything. Maybe she should stop running so fast, but she doesn’t want to be slower than Kazemaru or Shirou, and so she can’t do that.

“Hey, Shiratoya.”

“Call me Nae,” she says automatically, without even registering who’s speaking. Then, it clicks: a female’s voice, but not as high-pitched or honey-sweet as Rika’s. In this testosterone-manned team, there’s only one possibility. She turns around, smiling through the pain on her head, shoulders, knees — “What do you need, Touko-chan?”

Touko doesn’t look much better than her, all covered in dirt and bruises and sweat. Still, she manages to make it look admirable instead of pathetic, and  _ that _ ’s something Nae wants to learn to emulate. She’s panting, and she knows it’s not exactly cute — maybe it’s because she’s folding into herself where Touko stands tall, almost like a tower (pun totally intended).

“Er…” Something in Nae makes Touko’s words stumble, but she can’t for the life of her fathom what it is. “Can you, uh… teach me?”

Nae blinks. “Teach you? Teach you what?”

“To run.” Touko smiles, a bit self-deprecating, but then she seems to catch herself, and the smile turns confident and sheepish. Wow, so that’s the kind of training that the Prime Minister’s daughter has to undergo, huh? “I’ve noticed you’re the fastest player in the team, and I’m… kind of the slowest. I’ve always focused so much on defense that now I’m pretty unbalanced.”

“Oh,” Nae says, a bit stupidly (yay! someone’s noticed she’s the fastest!). She shakes her head to regain her bearings. So Touko wants to strike a deal, right? Then Nae has to get something in return too. (Not that she wouldn’t help if she got nothing, but, well. If she pretends she wouldn’t, she’ll get something, and that’s better than nothing. A tried and tested tactic.) “You’re good at stamina, right?”

Touko preens under the praise, no matter how much she tries to hide it under a layer of confidence. “Yeah!”

“I’ll give you speed training pointers if you give me stamina pointers. Looks good to you?” Nae’s so not good at endurance. This team maybe hasn’t noticed it yet, because she’s only played one half of a serious match and against a pretty weak team (sorry, Osaka Gals), but her lack of stamina was a source of merciless teasing back in Hakuren. 

At least, Touko looks like she hasn’t noticed, which says a lot about her hiding abilities (or her luck). Not that she needs confirmation on those, after the Big Secret she’s been hiding since her first day on this world… 

“Alright, you have yourself a deal,” she says, and they trade grins at the same time they do pointers. It’s pretty fun for a boring part of training.

While she’s speaking with Touko, Nae feels pinpricks stabbing her in the nape. She turns around, frowning, but only manages to catch Rika averting her gaze. Why was she staring at her like that? Nae already made it clear she wasn’t after Ichinose, so. Weird.

Nae is worried. 

That in itself isn’t uncommon. It may not seem like it, but Nae gets worried a lot, like, er, when she woke up in a new dimension without all her friends, or when she saw people she knew in her old dimension hurting themselves with dangerous hissatsus, or… or…

Or...

_ Huh _ , she doesn’t worry that much. Who knew. Maybe it’s a bit alarming, then, that she’s worried for Shirou. Maybe it’s a signal that he’s dying. (That thought only makes her worry more, so — great job, mind. Nice going, there.)

Okay, so the deal is: Shirou is obsessing a bit over his training. And when she says _ a bit _ , she means  _ a lot _ . An entire lot. An extra lot. A lot of lots. Plenty.

He doesn’t speak to the rest of the team anymore, when previously he seemed to be getting comfortable with his role here, little by little. Yeah, Someoka was his main point of contact, but… he got along with the rest! And now he only grunts or smiles vacantly when they speak to him! When  _ she _ goes to speak with him!

At first, she plans to let him stim on his own, because maybe he needs some space. But nope, that doesn’t solve anything. Shirou continues self-isolating, and she continues worrying for him.

So she’s now passed to the second step of her one-step plan: nagging. She’s not one to nag, usually, but this Shirou draws all the annoyingness she used to save exclusively for— yeah. Haha. What nice weather.

Anyways.

“Shirou,” she says to the boy, who is glaring at the goal as if it’s his greatest enemy. His eyes are the faintest tinge of orange, but not nearly as much as usual. He doesn’t answer her. “Shirou,” she repeats, but no response. “Shirou. Shirou. Shirou. Shirou, Shirou, Shirou. Shiroooooooooooooooooooooooooou. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanswer meeeeeee—”

“What,” he snaps, turning to face her, “do you want.”

And Nae - she winces, because she’s never had a friend look at her like Shirou is looking at her now, like she’s nothing more than a particularly annoying chewing gum stuck to the sole of his shoe. Not even —  _ him _ , in his most aggressive moments, had glanced at her as if she wasn’t more than a bother.

She frowns, ignores the stinging in her chest. “There’s no need to be so rude.”

“There’s no need to be so annoying,” he retorts, and this time Nae actually glares.

“Hey! What’s gotten into you? I understand that you feel - I don’t know, weak or alone or whatever after what happened with Someoka, but really? I’m only trying to help you!  _ We _ ’re only trying to help you!”

Shirou’s eyes are now entirely orange, and his hair is spiked up. Apparently, this means he’s behaving like a bitch, because his answer is, “Well, I don’t need your help!”

Nae gapes, and her face burns. How can he say that, after… after her being here to help him? After the team having helped him cheer up? Yeah, he hasn’t asked for it, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t need it! He should realise it more than anyone. “Are you stupid or what? Everybody needs help!”

Shirou doesn’t answer, just turns around and continues kicking a roughed-up ball. That, in itself, is more telling than anything he could voice, so Nae gathers all her remaining dignity and stomps out of the room, chin raised high but mood dangerously low. She’ll go train, to cool her head off.

Ignoring Shirou, probably her best friend here, should feel pretty lonely, but thankfully, it’s not as bad as she expected.

First things first: Raimon is the friendliest team ever, even when factoring Hakuren into the equation. She hadn’t really noticed before, too preoccupied with Shirou’s mental health, but they have really included her among their ranks. If she wants a conversation, someone — anyone, everyone — will give her a conversation. 

It’s... pretty nice, especially after she’d been worried that she would start to feel alone after that spat with Shirou. Speaking about that, nobody’s ever pressed her on the matter, even if they have noticed for sure that Nae’s been aggressively cheerful and Shirou’s been quieter than usual, sometimes sneaking glances in her direction. Well, Nae won’t complain. She doesn’t want to talk about it, after all.

That’s why it’s a bit weird, walking through Osaka on her own, after being glued to someone in the team for the last two days. It’s not bad weird, but weird all the same. 

She tries to enjoy her newfound solitude: sightseeing, riding more attractions, buying things, eating more things… While she’s savouring her recently bought crepe (oh là  _ là _ !), a flash of blue and yellow sprints towards her. Seconds later, she has a cowering Ichinose gripping her shoulders.

“Shiratoya,” he says, eyes flickering around desperately, like a frightened zebra looking for the lion chasing it. 

Oh, she knows what’s happening here. Her lips twitch. “Nae.”

“Nae,” he corrects instantly. His grip tightens, until it actually hurts a little, but before she has time to tell him to drop it, he grits out, “Please.  _ Please _ , help me out. Save me.”

She munches on her crepe thoughtfully. It may be a bit cruel to Rika, to lie to her to save Ichinose, but, well, she’s a bit clingy — okay, a lot clingy — and frankly, Ichinose doesn’t deserve it. 

“What do you want me to do?” she asks around a mouthful of food. It may not come as clear as she thinks, but who knows. Ichinose clearly understands it, so that’s that.

“When she comes here,” his gaze flickers around again, “please, point her towards the wrong direction.”

With that said, he breaks out running to the left, towards the ferris wheel. And just in time! One second later, Rika’s blue hair peeks through the mob, and soon, she’s in front of Nae, beaming at her. She’s pretty cute like that: the determined gleam in her eyes makes them  _ shine _ . It’s a wonder Ichinose doesn’t return her feelings, but then again, Nae’s seen the looks he throws at Aki when he thinks she’s not looking, and. Yeah.

“Hi, Nae!” she says, and the grin doesn’t waver. “Have you seen my darling? He’s been running from me all day! Do you think he’s nervous? Like, it’s not that I don’t understand being nervous in front of  _ me _ , but he shouldn’t be, because we’re going to be together forever!” She grabs Nae’s arm. “By the way, you and I — and Touko and the managers and coach — have to have a girls’ night.”

Aw, now Nae feels guilty for being in a ploy to trick her.

She’s about to tell Rika where Ichinose has really gone to, just because she would feel kind of mean if she didn’t. But, as if sensing her intentions, Ichinose’s head peeks from behind the corner of a building. He mouths  _ Please! Don’t tell her where I am! _ , and his expression is - desperate. Ugh. Now Nae will feel guilty if she tells her too. What a dilemma.

She puts all her thoughts in her expression — hopefully, Ichinose will catch on what she’s doing for him. Renouncing to her honesty. Abandoning her morals. Deceiving a comrade. The most unforgivable sin of all. She will go to hell.

Anyways. Her gaze returns to Rika, who’s looking at her expectantly. How much time has it been since she’s formulated her question? Whoops. Hopefully it hasn’t been  _ that _ much — she doesn’t want Rika to think she’s weird, after all. 

“Yeah! We should do that!” Nae grins. “And as for Ichinose… I saw him go that way,” she says, not moving her finger to point at anywhere. She was about to do it, but… she needs to prepare herself for the lie. Just a little more time.

Rika tilts her head. “What way?”

“That.” Her finger still hasn’t moved. In the background, Ichinose grimaces. Sorry, man, but she’s not a master liar here. She has to mentalise herself. And she’ll start right about - now. Yeah.

Rika frowns. “Where?”

And Nae - Nae breathes in, breathes out, and  _ moves _ . Her arm snaps open wide as she thrusts her hip to turn around, slams her foot to the ground. Then, her finger flies from her closed fist, as she screeches, “THERE!”, pointing to the right.

Where there was chatter, now there’s silence. The people around have stopped to stare at her: some parents cover their children’s eyes, some immature teenagers (wow, she sounds so old) have pulled out their phones and started to record her. Her ears burn, but she doesn’t move from her position. 

Rika, for her part, is smiling at her, teasing. “There was no need to be so empathetic, but. Thanks!” That said, she scurries to the direction Nae pointed her towards. “Here I go, darling!”

Nae drops her posture the moment she can’t see that bright blue hair anymore, and buries her burning face in her hands. Ichinose, who had apparently approached her when Rika left, pats her in the back. Nae groans.

“Thanks for that,” he says, a bit awkward.

She raises her head just to pout at him. “You’re welcome.”

Next morning: another match against Epsilon, because apparently they don’t have better things to do. Hooray.

“Don’t you guys have better things to do?” she asks (again: not one for internalising), cutting Saginuma off in the middle of his monologue. He looks at her, blankly, and proceeds right where he left off, without answer. Nae sighs - is about to whine to Shirou (who, this time, is her partner in forwarding) before she remembers, and her mouth closes with a click.

Her mood — it doesn’t plummet, but it dips down a little. 

The match starts, and well, it’s more of the same as the last matches: Epsilon attacks and they can’t stop it, except that Raimon pulls something out of their ass and somehow go through the match without letting in more than two goals; the forwards manage to score a goal or two with determination, clever strategy and/or a convenient power-up; Saginuma sprouts random things; Endou tells them to play football, despite the fact that they’re already playing.

What’s happening now: Nae has the ball. Nae is a forward. Nae is dashing among Epsilon players as if they are cardboard-cut dolls, instead of real people. And - wow. She was  _ fast _ before, but her current speed is practically supersonic. That training center has done wonders on—

She trips on the ball, just when she’s in front of the goal.

Screeching, Nae flails. The ground is coming closer, closer,  _ closer _ , until her face slams on it and she tastes the grass. Her legs continue flying forward, her head as a fulcrum, her poor neck bending and cricking and ow! Her legs lean forward into a makeshift ouroboros. 

There’s a noise of a football being kicked. 

With a last ditch attempt at strength, Nae pushes her neck up, just in time for her butt to hit the ground. She pants, straightening herself and rubbing her nap. Her flexibility has been a curse on more than one time, but this is the first time she always breaks her neck because of it. A normal person’s body would have fallen backwards but nooooooo, hers had to continue forward.

When Nae finally manages to sit up, the whole pitch is silent and staring at her. She frowns. Not that she didn’t expect  _ someone _ to be staring, but, come on!, all the players? Don’t they have better things to do, such as, she doesn’t know, playing football? Scoring a goal? Hello?

Whatever. She’ll have to be the only reasonable person in this entire match.

Her eyes flicker over the ground, in search of the ball. Not there… Not there, either… Annnnd not there… 

Oh! It’s there! 

Inside… the goal...

Has. Has she actually scored with her weird pirouette? Is that why everyone is staring at her?

...Alright.

“Hahahaha! I’m the best!” She gets up, pats the dirt off her butt, and laughs. She flexes, and then puts her hands behind her head and starts to hop. “Did you see that? Bunny, bunny, bunny!”

Endou starts to clap, and soon everybody congratulates her. Touko claps her in the back, Rika high fives her, Domon fist bumps her. She grins, but can’t help to side-eye Shirou, wanting, against her better judgement. 

Their eyes meet, and her heart skips a beat. Not because of her being in love or something like that, but because of his eyes. They’re orange, burning with - something. And not a good something — an intimidating something, a flame that wants to consume her and eat her whole. 

Nae shivers, and tears her eyes away. She still feels his gaze boring into the side of her head, but refuses to look. He can take that hunger and shove it where he wants to. Wherever, but away from her.

And that’s the first half. 

Nae spends the break leaning her head on the wall with her eyes closed, trying not to think but doing it anyways. She shouldn’t be so shaken — it was just some eyes! —, but, well, she couldn’t help it. Her mind rewinds and repeats the moment when their gazes meet time and time again, every time a bit number than the last, until, finally, she doesn’t feel anything but a low, sick twistiness in her stomach.

Then, the second half starts.

Shirou is itchy, next to her. Again, against her better judgement, Nae sneaks glances his way, and - he’s always moving. Changing his weight from foot to foot, twisting his ankles in a rudimentary stretch, rolling his shoulders… (Lowering and raising his eyes again, pressing and unpressing his lips together, breathing a little too fast and then a little too slow.) It would be kind of hypnotizing, if Nae weren’t angry with him.

The whistle blows, the Epsilon forwards pass the ball between them, and Nae starts to run. 

Nothing really relevant happens at first. Both teams have the ball during more or less the same time, no one fully manages to score, the works. Nae’s eyes still gravitate to Shirou from time to time, even if she wills them not to. He’s playing as he always does when he goes into orange mode, chasing after the ball like a lion chasing after a zebra, but something about him is restless, almost… desperate.

Nae’s suspicions are proved correct when he just—

— _ snaps _ .

One second he’s glaring at Segata (oh, sorry: Zel), who’s running towards Ichinose, and the other, he’s  _ dashing _ . Uncaring that they’re in the same team, Shirou steals the ball from Ichinose and sprints with it, dribbling everyone that gets in his way, both players from Epsilon and from Raimon.

“Shirou!” comes from Raimon’s goal, when Shirou is just three defenders away from Saginuma. A look back reveals Endou, cupping his hand around his mouth with a troubled frown. “What are you doing? Pass the ball!”

Shirou ignores him, ignores everyone screaming at him to stop — well, everyone but Nae, who’s speechless. He makes dribbling Epsilon’s last line of defense easy, and scoring a goal from Saginuma practically effortless. Just one Eternal Blizzard and bam! The ball is slamming against the net.

He turns around, hands on his hip and a grin on his lips, and faces the team. Everybody is silent, staring at him, incredulous and maybe disappointed. It’s hard to focus on others’ feelings when an anaconda is constricing her heart, but she thinks that’s what happening here: the team is disappointed with Shirou. She kind of is, too.

His grin soon wavers, and it’s not long before it vanishes completely, substituted by confused, uneasy eyes. And then, by shadowed ones, pointed at the team but not really seeing anything.

Nae averts her eyes when his gaze settles on her. 

They win the match by one goal, but the mood isn’t too victorious, to say the least. 

For starters, Shirou had passed out. While everyone was pretty disappointed in him for his solo goal, he was still a member of the team, and, as such, everyone had rushed to him the moment his limp body hit the floor. Well, everybody except her, who had been left staring at Shirou’s unseeing eyes with a cold stomach and a swirling mind. 

He’s now in the hospital, pending examination. Raimon isn’t there yet, because they’re stuck with the second reason they’re not cheering their victory, but they will hurry there the moment this finishes. Or at least Nae will. She won’t be able to sleep tonight if she doesn’t — maybe not even then. 

The second reason: an Aliea ball lands on the pitch the moment the final whistle sounds. Hidden in the smoke the hit produced, there’s a silhouette. Only one icy, grey eye is visible, but Nae already knows who this person is. 

“Suzuno?” she says, just to continue the trend. She already knows it’s him one-hundred percent. The eye snaps to her, unreadable emotions swimming in it. Some surprise? And anger. Yeah, probably those. 

The smoke dissipates, though, and by that time, Suzuno, now clearly visible in all his elegant and slightly-more-fashionable-than-his-mates glory, is looking at Saginuma and his cowered team. There’s a subtle smirk on his lips and a cold glint in his eye — not good news for Saginuma, huh?

“Gazel,” Saginuma says, a touch of fear in his voice even if his face is schooled into a neutral expression. Oh, no. Nae knows what is going to happen, and she doesn’t like it. She doesn’t like it at all. “Why are you here?”

“You already know.” Suzuno’s voice is frigid and merciless as he balances the ball on his foot. Nae shivers, hugs herself. She doesn’t want to see this. “Any last words?”

“Wait!” The panic is more evident now, both in his voice and in his face. Something tugs at her heart, but frankly, she’s too tired to act on it. “Allow us one more chance. We have been developing... another form, mightier and more menacing. If you give us one more chance, another team will bloom to life in us!”

Suzuno starts to kick the ball on his foot. “Yes, another team will  _ bloom to life _ ,” he mocks, and his smirk falls into a blank, terrifying deadpan. “But it will not be you. Goodbye.”

“No! Don’t—”

Suzuno kicks the ball, and it  _ explodes _ towards Epsilon. Smoke erupts, and when it vanishes, only Suzuno is left. Nae breathes in, out; in, out; in, out. Finally, when the blood rushing to her ears recedes, she focuses again on him. Her camp of vision swims a little, but overall, she manages to see. See his blue-white shirt, his uglyass chest stone, his grey hair, his eyes as they examine them, dragging a little on Shirou’s empty spot.

“Pathetic,” he says, and disappears, leaving them in an uncomfortable, restless silence.


	5. V: Fukuoka

Okay, she has to say this: Tachimukai is  _ adorable _ . 

Ever since they arrived at his school, he’s been following Endou like a baby duck, listening to whatever he says with enraptured attention. And true, Endou drops bits of wisdom from time to time, but most of the time it’s like “wow, what a nice building” or “ooooooooh, have you seen that beautiful bird?” 

Admittedly, that’s a pretty nice way to spend an afternoon, now that she thinks about it. Maybe she should take a page out of Tachimukai’s book.

But argh! She wants him as  _ her _ disciple. Why does he have to admire Endou? She’s pretty nice, too! Life’s not fair, and it’s never been as clear as now. Sigh. 

Like, the kid is a devoted fan. Apparently, he was a midfielder before, but now he’s a goalkeeper because of his admiration for Endou.  _ And _ he’s learnt all of Endou’s hissatsus, if he’s to be believed, even one that took Endou blood, sweat and tears to get right. She doesn’t want to imagine poor Tachimukai crying.

On other news: Shirou has woken up. Bittersweet yay! Hitomiko hasn’t revealed to the team what happened to him, and he seems struck on pretending he’s never even fallen unconscious in the first place, so they’ll be left unknowing forever. His eyes turn orange more frequently now, but nobody mentions that either. She would, but she’s still not speaking to him, so. 

Well, Nae doesn’t miss him. Yeah, not at all! And because she doesn’t miss him, she’ll go spend her afternoon withhhhhh…

“Tachimukai-kun!” She waves her arm, side to side, so that the startled boy can spot her. When he does, she approaches. “Hi! How’re you?”

He blinks, a deer caught in the headlights. There’s even a little blush on his cheeks. Cute. “I - uh - er… Fine? I’m… fine. What… about you?” 

She beams, propping herself up on her toes. “I’m glad! I’m fine too!” And before an uncomfortable silence can form, she barrels on, “Say, how good a goalkeeper are you?”

“I’m - I’d like to think I’m good,” he says, and then blushes up to the roots of his hair. He waves his hands frantically. “N-not as good as Endou-san, of course! He’s way, way better than me!”

Nae purses her lips, switches her weight from foot to foot. Is this an inferiority complex or is that true? She would bet on the first, but well, better to make sure: “Have you played against him?”

“I wish!” he blurts out, and then his blush darkens. “I-I mean, no. No, I haven’t.” Ooooh, he’s stuttering less! Nice.

“Then don’t say you are worse than him!” She pokes his forehead, like in that one anime. He goes cross-eyed to look at her finger. “If you haven’t played against him, you don’t have any evidence.”

“B-but!” he says. “Have you  _ seen  _ him? It’s Endou-san! There’s no way he’d lose against anyone! He’s the best goalkeeper in the world!”

Nae’s lips twitch. This is so, so adorable.

“Who knows.” She shrugs. “Maybe you are better.”

Tachimukai gasps as if she’s just sprouted a mortal offense against his mother, and then begins listing all of Endou’s good qualities as a goalkeeper and a captain. When he’s on Strength #73: Endou Is Able To Better Hissatsus On The Fly, Nae looks skyward. This is going to be a  _ long _ conversation.

The match against Yokato…

Don’t misunderstand her or her ellipsis: Raimon wins, and it’s not too hard either. Nae plays as a forward with Rika, and they make a pretty fun double team. Not the most effective out there, because they haven’t spent nearly as much time together as they need for that, but passing the ball amongst them, encouraging each other… Yeah, that’s why Nae plays football.

So why the ellipsis, then? Well, that’s because — and this is becoming a depressing trend — of Shirou. 

He hasn’t been allowed to play in this match, okay? Which is logical, because he’s just come out of the hospital and all, but apparently, he doesn’t agree with that decision. He didn’t argue with Hitomiko, ‘cause nobody argues with her, but he made one of those faces. You know the ones. The puppy-eyed, dejected face, with knitted eyebrows and parted mouth and disappointed eyes.

And then, he’d plopped his ass on the bench like, let his body fall and smash against the bench, and he’s been staring at Nae since then. And not the lovey-dovey stare (she’s been on the end of that one too many times to not recognise it) but, once again, the hungry, feral one. She refused to look at him during the whole match, but she still  _ felt  _ it, digging into her nape, her back, everything.

Eventually, once the match finishes, the feeling disappears, but Nae is left unnerved and shivering the rest of the day.

Next morning, of course, Aliea attacks.

This time it’s another team. Obviously, it wasn’t going to be Saginuma’s, not after what happened, but it’s not Suzuno’s either. No, no, no, this is one who calls themselves Genesis (or Gaia, according to one of the players — but she’ll call them Genesis because it sounds cooler), and is lead by—

“Tatsuya!”

—her favourite Aliea boy, Kiyama Tatsuya! She’s been waiting for him all the time, wanting to see his pretty face again. He’s her first crush, after all, although that time has long since passed. Still, it’s nice to see her casual friend again. And Yagami Reina is here, too, which is the coolest — they’ve never spoken before, but there’s no reason not to start now, right? Right.

Oh, but Hiroto is missing. Too bad, she wants to see him too. It’s pretty difficult to imagine him far from Tatsuya but eh, he’s probably with Haizaki somewhere. Or maybe those two haven't met, now that she thinks about it. Now  _ that _ ’s a weird thought.

“Me?” Tatsuya blinks at her, and points at himself. Nae nods, and then he shakes his head. “I think you’re mistaken. They had informed me that you somehow knew our old names, but apparently the intel was mistaken…” He says this last sentence to himself, muttering and with a hand covering his mouth, but it’s still loud enough to be audible.

“Gran,” Yagami Reina warns, a dangerous look in her eyes. How cool!

“Oh, I was speaking to myself again, right? Sorry.” He smiles at them, sunnily and completely fake. “Anyways, as Ulvida here has said, I’m Gran. Nice to meet you,” he says, and doesn’t bow. Nae still nods her head into a minor bow, because she’s not a barbarian.

“Nice to meet you too,” she says, just for Touko to dig an elbow into her ribs. “Hey!”

“It’s not  _ nice _ to meet them, you idiot!” Touko whispers urgently, as if  _ Nae _ were the one being unreasonable. The audacity. 

She pouts. “But they seem nice. And I like nice people.”

“Anyways,” Tatsuya -- Gran? -- nah, Tatsuya is cooler -- Tatsuya says, and gestures to the team behind him. “I’m the captain of Genesis, and we’re going to destroy you. Sorry,” he adds, apparently realising that that statement was a bit too rude on its own.

Touko gestures frantically at them, as if that should tell Nae something. It doesn’t. She won’t consider them not nice, not when they share faces with great people in her old world. There’s not that much difference, at least in personalities, and she refuses to believe the Aliea kids want to destroy the world. There must be something fishy here.

Touko gives up with a huff, and drops her arms dejectedly. Nae pats her back.

This is two teams together, so obviously it ends up in a match. That didn’t take anyone — not even Kabeyama, the most oblivious of them all — by surprise.

What takes Nae by surprise — although maybe it shouldn’t have, considering that they’re both forwards in this team’s eyes — is that she’s leading the attack, along with Shirou. Awkward. 

She guesses she can see Hitomiko’s logic in making that decision: they worked well together previously to stopping talking, and maybe playing together again will make them solve their differences. Besides, they’re Raimon’s current best forwards. Nae  _ can _ see it, and if she were a coach, she probably would use the same tactic. That, however, doesn’t mean she has to like it as a player. 

And it’s not really working, either. It’s partially her fault, but… she can’t bring herself to pass the ball to him, not after the last match he played, after watching him destroy himself for this sport. If he gets the ball, who knows what will happen to him. Nae doesn’t want to find out.

But not passing the ball to him is a double-edged sword, because that means she has to pass the ball to someone who’s in a position less favourable than his. And against a team like Genesis, that always means a stolen ball. Shirou still hasn’t touched the ball, so it’s mostly a win, but he’s getting more restless, which means he will be more reckless, and that’s certainly not a win.

In the bench, Hitomiko’s eyes are boring into her side. It’s a wonder she hasn’t changed Nae yet, really, but she won’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

Things get difficult when Genesis notices what she’s doing, and, because they think they’re funny, start to harass her to force her to pass the ball to Shirou. She refuses, but it ends with the ball stolen more often than not. Sadly, Genesis is somewhat like an immovable object here. Meanies.

And so the time comes when Nae tries her luck and passes the ball to Shirou. Who knows, maybe this’ll make him happy and return to the old, moderately happy Shirou. Maybe he won’t destroy himself in this match, the most dangerous they’ve ever had. 

Yeah. Maybe. 

Sigh.

But then the strangest thing happens. Genesis, who had been previously fully defensive (except when harassing her; again: meanies), standing in front of their goals and all, now… shuffles aside. Like, you know that biblical story? The Moses and the parting sea one? It’s just like that. Shirou is Moses, and Genesis is the sea, parting so that Shirou has a clear shot at the goal.

Man, this can’t be good.

After blinking confusedly, Shirou takes his chance. He’s on his orange mode, by the way, because he’s always like that when bad things happen to him. Hey, now that she thinks about it, lately he’s been in that form more often than not. That… can’t be good.

He doesn't score. That’s, of course, not surprising, because this world’s Aliea kids are, like, super powered-up, but really - stopping the shot without a hissatsu? Man, life is so, so unfair.

Apparently, Shirou thinks the same, because he actually growls. Like a feral animal. That kid needs some education. 

Of course, after that minor fiasco, there’s no way Nae’ll be trying her luck again, no matter if all eleven players of Genesis harass her. Even if Yagami Reina is very, very scary, and she’s looking at Nae as if she were a snack. Okay, maybe that has… connotations. What Nae means is that Yagami Reina looks at her as if she were easy to catch and easy to it. In a completely non-sexual way. Like a predator.

But Nae won’t waver. For Shirou’s mental health! Even if she’s surrounded by half the team, who aren’t doing anything more than stare menacingly at her and stop her from going through them. 

Ugh, this match is a drag.

She sticks her tongue out at them — more concretely, at Yagami Reina. “You are big, old bullies,” she says, and kicks the ball to one bulky guy's face. The guy tilts his head to avoid it, but hey, at least the ball’s passed. Small victories.

“You happy,” the guy deadpans, and his voice is low and rumbling. It would be soothing, in fact, if he didn’t come from a person who’s been stalking her all match. Stuff of her nightmares, really.

She grins at him without mirth. “Yes.” But then a flash of orange runs from behind him, kicking the ball, and her grin falls. “I changed my mind: no.”

Now it’s the bulky guy’s turn to smirk. Nae refuses to look cowed, even though she certainly is. “I’m glad.”

She huffs and puffs, but their unpleasant conversation is thankfully finished, and so she focuses on the stupid, stupid Shirou, who is kicking the stupid, stupid ball towards the stupid, stupid goalkeeper. Okay, maybe the ball isn’t stupid, but the rest of people mentioned are --- and very, in fact. 

Of course, Genesis doesn’t try to stop him, because why would they? It’s not like this is a serious match, pfffft. Who even suggested that, man. They’re so stupid. Haha. This is a circus. A mockery of football. But — she sighs — she guesses each plays as each wants, even if it’s using psychological warfare.

“ETERNAL BLIZZARD!” goes Shirou, and the goalkeeper stops it without a hissatsu, for the thousandth time. This would be the time to pass and let anyone else try their luck, but whenever anyone other than Shirou tries to shoot, Genesis steals the ball from them and passes it to Shirou. 

“Don’t you think it’s a little bit cruel?” Nae asks, to no one in particular. She’s still surrounded by four players, which now that she thinks about it is a bit of an overkill. This is probably another intimidation tactic. “Like, it’s pretty clear you can destroy us. Why pick him out instead of pummeling us as a team?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Yagami Reina — of all people — answers, not even sparing her a glance.

“You’re right.” She looks back to Shirou, who is now staring at his hands with a conflicted expression on his face. He’s about to explode, and it’s not going to be pretty. “I don’t.”

Aish, so this is like being stuck between a rock and a hard place is like, huh? There’s no way out here — at least, not one that she can see. Genesis will continue harassing her and demoralising Shirou until the final whistle blows, and there’s nothing, absolutely nothing, she can do to avoid it;  _ that’s _ how enormous the power difference is here.

(...Well, she could kick and injure someone, but that would get her out of the match and maybe the team, so that’s not a risk she wants to take. Besides, that’s even less football than the football they’re playing now.)

But then, another whistle sounds, way before the match finishes. Turning her head around reveals Hitomiko has gotten up. A switch, huh…? It’s obvious who she’s changing.

“Shiratoya! Fubuki!”

Yeah.

It’s not that she doesn’t want Shirou to get out of here, but Nae wants to play a little more, as futile and frustrating as it feels. This is a rival team they’ll have to defeat sooner or later, and the more she remains on the pitch, the better she’ll learn their moves.

But well, if it mattered what Nae wanted, she would still be in her dimension, so. The circle parts for her, and she walks towards the bench, unashamed. No one goes in their place, but well, that doesn’t really matter. At this point, they’ll lose even if two genii replace them. It’s best to not demoralise any more players, she guesses.

In that vein, why doesn’t she give the match up? Like, coaches can throw the match, right? Nae’s never seen it happen but it’s sure to be one of the many, many (many, many) things they can do, right? Why is she still letting this match happen and everyone get hurt?

Wait, train of thought, stop! Hitomiko looks like she wants to speak! Don’t continue!

“What is it, coach?” Nae prompts, because she doesn’t have all day for Hitomiko to finish gathering her thoughts. Shirou is sitting next to her, close enough that she can feel his body warmth. He’s silent; Nae has to strain her ears to even hear him breathe.

“You…” Hitomiko begins, and trails off. Her eyes bore into Shirou, and then into Nae. “Why didn’t you pass the ball to Fubuki, Shiratoya? And Fubuki: why did you keep playing alone when it became clear that you couldn’t? ”

Nae grimaces. With Shirou here? It’s not that she would want to answer this question while in private, but - with Shirou here? 

She keeps silent. Hopefully, Hitomiko will keep lecturing them and forget about her question. Maybe it’s rhetoric, and she doesn’t actually need an answer. God, she hopes it’s rhetorical.

“Well?” she says, eyebrows forming an elegant and displeased frown, when they don’t answer. Nae can’t hear Shirou’s breaths anymore. Is he holding his breath? “This isn’t a game, even if it is football. You both have great deals of talent and skill, but I don’t have any need for players who can’t take things seriously, no matter how skilled they are. So if you think this is all a game, don’t waste our time and pack your things.”

Shirou takes a shuddering breath, but Nae doesn’t have any mental space to focus on it, not while she’s mulling on Hitomiko’s words. 

She’s not taking everything like a joke… she thinks. It’s true she doesn’t see Aliea as evil villains who want to destroy everything they love, but that’s because she knows —  _ knows _ , down to her bones — they’re kids like her. Younger than her, now, and wow does that thought feel weird and lonely.

Still! There are greys here, and she’s sure the Aliea kids are on one of them. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t take football seriously, even if it’s not  _ if I don’t win, the Earth will get destroyed _ seriously. She’s (was) part of one of the best teams of the country, please. You don’t go that far without taking  _ some _ things seriously.

So yeah, Hitomiko is wrong, and she will correct her. “I do things seriously,” Nae says, frowning. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

Now Hitomiko’s attention is fully on her. Great. She refuses to shiver. 

“That’s not what I mean,” she says, with a tone way more softer than she expected, at least if you based it on her piercing eyes. Maybe she’s not  _ that _ angry. “I know you do. But if you have a problem with one of the players, I expect you to communicate it to me, to avoid situations like today.”

Nae bites her lip. She guesses Hitomiko is being reasonable, but… it’s weird, trusting in a coach that’s not her dad. Does. Does that mean she has trust issues with authority? She’s never had any trauma related to it… 

Accepting it doesn’t mean that she’s betraying her dad, it doesn’t, it doesn’t. It may hurt, but she has to do it to keep moving forward, to advance with this loveable team. And so, after thirty seconds steeling herself, she says, “Alright,” and the world shifts, settles into a new groove. “Alright, next time — if there’s one, of course, but there won’t — I’ll tell you.”

“Have you solved the current problem with Shirou?” After a pause, she adds, “Are you close to solving it, or at least, putting into practice possible solutions?”

Nae squirms, looks to her hands resting in her lap. “Er, no, but…”

She’s already kind of forgiven Shirou, but she  _ refuses _ to go back to normal without an apology. Like, he was rude and an asshole, and even if he really thought he didn’t need her help, he should have refused it in a more delicate way! So yeah, the heat has already left, but her common sense is right there to hold the grudge.

“Then, I advise that you let me mediate the problem.” Hitomiko’s eyes flicker between her and Shirou, and she (Hitomiko) purses her lips a little — just a little, but enough to show some unrest. Hey, now that she focuses on it, isn’t Shirou muttering something? Something like pathe— “What happened?”

And Nae intends to answer, she really does! But Shirou insulting himself requires sparing him a glance, and sparing him a glance means seeing his pallid face, his shaking hands, and the way he’s trying to tug his scarf loose as if it’s strangulating him. What - what is happening to him? How can she not have noticed, when he’s sitting next to her?

Holding her breath in, she waves her hand in front of his face, but he doesn’t react. His eyes - they’re unseeing, unfocused; where there was previously silver, now there’s dull grey.

“C-coach,” she stammers, looking back at Hitomiko. She’s expressionless, but the kind of expressionless she knows very well, thanks to sharing a team with one Kitami Ryuu for three years. It’s the panicked expressionless for when you don’t know what to do, but you also don’t know how to show emotions.

Hitomiko doesn’t answer. So yeah, she is useless now, trapped in her head. Great. Just - great. What does Nae do now? Is Shirou having a panic attack? How do you deal with panic attacks? Or maybe it’s not a panic attack—

Argh, she can’t deal with so many thoughts! She’s not a psychologist, so she can’t make a diagnosis here and hope it’s correct! Screw it, she’ll just take his hands and go with whatever happens. Her father always takes her hands when she’s sad and it works!

He tenses — wow, has her hunch failed so completely? —, but then, relaxes, so sudden and intense that it’s almost like he’s melting. His head drops on her shoulder. She very carefully doesn’t move, doesn’t even breathe, even when Raimon groans and screams and gets hurt and she’s dying to turn her neck and watch. Just - takes breaths, measured and controlled, and hopes that the books she’s read are right and that Shirou will imitate them and calm down.

After an undetermined amount of time (closer to long than short, if you go on the way her back is starting to hurt from her position; she still won’t move), the final whistle sounds. And Nae just - cranes her head a  _ little _ \- just a little, enough to look but not enough to disturb Shirou - and she sees 0 - 20, chalk white glaring at her from a greenboard. 

She exhales a shaky breath. Woah. She’s never seen such a massacre, and she’s seen Outei play against some very bad teams—

Oh, wait, her breaths have to be measured. Don’t fail at this, too.

Her inhale is normal. Normal length, normal consistency, normal everything. Her next exhale is, too, even if her heart is hammering against her ribcage and her head feels light, too light to be healthy. She doesn’t know how well she’s going to sleep tonight: well, because this day has been pretty tiring emotionally speaking, or badly, because this day has been pretty tiring emotionally speaking?

Anyways.

She locks eyes with Tatsuya, teal meeting teal. He’s standing along with his team on a side of the pitch — most of it is being occupied by Raimon players, either crumpled on the floor or sitting, staring at the sky. His eyes - they’re full of something dark and cruel. Disappointment? Unsurprise? Pity?

Whatever it is, Nae holds the stare — Raimon isn’t finished here, no matter what he thinks, not with Endou on the team. It’s a long moment, in which no one wins but no one gives up, either. She wonders what he sees reflected in her eyes, but well, it doesn’t really matter, does it?

The moment is over as soon as it begins. Tatsuya tilts his head, eyes turning unreadable, and his team vanishes between one blink and the other.

It starts to rain. Nae still doesn’t move. 

Kazemaru and Kurimatsu leave the team. In any other circumstances, that would make Nae at least a bit sad, at least; a bit grieving. Right now, though, it’s nothing more than a blip in her worry radar, ‘cause it’s being completely occupied by Shirou. Shirou, who hasn’t moved since she made him walk to the caravan. Shirou, who’s been staring out of the window since she made him sit there. Shirou, whose eyes are blank, lethargic. 

Empty.

Don’t misunderstand her. It’s not that she’s not sad about them leaving. Her chest tightens when she hears the news, and she thinks about them more than usual as she goes on her day, even if she’d never spoken much to either. But - she would be sadder, if Shirou weren’t the way he is now, if you catch her deal. 

So, Nae just sits next to the still boy, and dozes practically all day. If he needs her for something, he’ll tell her. She still reminds him she’s there for him, of course, because she doesn’t want pride to harm his mental health. She would pay more attention to him, but honestly, she’s still... not angry, but not unangry either. And after the Genesis match’s emotional exhaustion, she needs to sleep.

And sleep she does.

When she wakes up, moderately rested and with energy, it’s to find Raimon’s atmosphere shattered, pessimism slipping through the cracks. And usually she would want to fix it, but right now she plainly just doesn’t have the energy. And so, she rests her head against Shirou’s shoulder, and—

She falls asleep again.

This time, when she wakes up, she’s completely rested, and more importantly, ready ro train and do something about the mood of the team and train and prove Gran wrong and train and train and train. Because this isn’t a joke, and although she’s never taken it as one, she’s never taken it completely seriously either. So, that’ll have to change. She’ll get better.

With more cheer than she feels, she jumps off her seat (taking care of not startling Shirou, who’s asleep against the window) and chirps, “Good morning, everyone!” Judging by the position of the sun, it’s not  _ morning _ — so she corrects: “Good afternoon, everyone!”

There’s almost no people in the caravan; just the driver, in fact. Well, and Shirou, but he’s sleeping so he doesn’t count. “Good afternoon, Shiratoya-san,” he answers, slow and kind. She’s always liked drivers for that — they’re all very, very good people. At least, the ones she knows.

“Where is the rest of the team, driver-san?” she asks, approaching the doors of the caravan. She should find out his name, but asking about it at this point feels rude.

The driver’s grimace doesn’t say many good things about the team’s situation, but she’d expected that from her last venture to the living world. She’s ready to step into a team of doom and gloom. You hear it?  _ Ready. _

“They’re outside — most of them,” he says, tapping the wheel with his finger. Does he never get out of here? She hopes he’s paid well, because the back pain that must cause is certainly unspeakable. “Endou-kun… isn’t.”

“Endou? Our Endou?” The driver nods. “What’s happened to him? He’s not playing football?”

Okay, remember when she thought she was ready to step into a team of doom and gloom? Well, she wasn’t factoring Endou in that surprising equation. She was counting on Endou to be cheering everyone! She wasn’t counting on this! Kazemaru’s and Kurimatsu’s leaving has sure affected him, then,

And when the driver informs her that he’s the most depressed one of them all — that he’s the only one not playing football — Nae purses her lips together and makes a resolution. She’ll cheer him up, first.

“Okay, thank you, mister!” She musters up a smile for the kind man and runs out of the bus. 

She doesn’t know where Endou is, so she either has to go ask a teammate or wander blindly until she finds him. Honestly, she’s not in the mood for too much social interaction, but eh. It’ll do her good. It’s always done that, even when she wanted to be alone, too tired to smile for anyone. Perks of being an extrovert, she guesses. 

And so she goes to the pitch, because where there are football players, there will always be one in the pitch, no matter what time or weather it is. It’s one of the rules of life, along with  _ Don’t touch Nae’s iDOLM@STER poster! _ But the thing here is this: everyone but Endou is playing, with melancholic but determined smiles on their faces.

She hadn’t thought it was possible until now.

“Nae!” Rika’s voice startles her out of her thoughts, and she glances around to see the owner jogging towards her, a sly grin on her face. “You hadn’t told me you and Shirou were…” Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. “If you know what I mean.”

Nae frowns, taken aback. “We aren’t!” It’s been a long time since someone’s accused the Princess and the Prince of Hakuren to be dating, proving how little of an acquaintance they’ve had with good taste. Honestly, as if she would date someone like  _ him _ .

“Oh, yeah?” Rika drawls, quirking an eyebrow. “Then why were you so lovey-dovey in there?”

They’ve never been lovey-dovey in their entire lives. Thank God. “In where?”

“In the caravan!” She stomps the floor, pouting. It’s the same expression Nae uses when she thinks someone’s pulling a joke on her, but c’mon! This isn’t a joke! She wouldn’t date Shirou if he were the last man on Earth. He’s more like his bratty twin than he wants to admit. “You don’t mean to tell me that you sleeping with your head on his shoulder and him with his head on top of yours isn’t something lovers do!”

“Well, yeah. But it’s also something friends do! Like us. Friends. Just that!” Rika half-glares at her, but she looks mildly convinced, so. Good enough. “Anyways, where’s Endou?” Rika grimaces. “Yeah, I know the deal with him, that’s why I want to find him.”

Rika blinks at her, but, for once, doesn’t press. She just points to the top of a building. “There. He’s been sulking there for, like, a day and a half, and won’t come down no matter what we say. If you want to try, well.” She shrugs. “Good luck. Hope you’re the one to get into his thick skull!”

Nae grins. You see? She was right — refreshed already. “Thanks!” she says, and runs to the gates of the building. 

“We still have a girls’ night due!” Rika calls out as she grabs the door handle.

Nae tilts her head a little, to look at her. “Yeah!” she screams back, and goes into the building.

Endou’s small figure, crumpled pitifully under the rain… startles her. She’d been expecting something bad, but this is plain depressing. To see the team’s pillar crumbled, stillness where there should be movement — well, let’s just say that she’ll have the image in the back of her mind for a very, very long time, as a reminder of how far you can fall if you dare to fly too high.

Nae stops walking when she’s halfway there and he hasn’t so much as twitched. Rain hits her skin. Something weirdly like panic curls in her belly, cold and all-encompassing: if she can’t even help Shirou, one of her most precious people and someone who she’s known for  _ years _ , how can she possibly help Endou, who she’s known for a few weeks? She’s always been a bit useless in the helping people department, way better at being helped than helping—

She crushes all of those thoughts, because she’s not a coward, and continues walking forward. If she’s not good at helping, she will get good, starting today.

The rain split-splatters as she approaches him, and it PLSH!es when she sits next to Endou, resting her butt on a puddle. Her lower body immediately gets all wet, but she ignores it in favour of smiling softly and saying, “Hey.”

He doesn’t answer, doesn’t even look at her. She squashes the urge to call him out for being rude, and continues speaking. Well, first, she has to think of something to say — this has all been so spontaneous she hasn’t thought of anything beyond  _ I have to help!! _

But because she’s not in the mood for thinking, Nae blurts out the first thing that comes to mind, which is, “I once showed up to a team meeting in my cute bunny pajamas.”

She refuses to let her face burn (although the heat would be welcome; seriously how long has Endou been out here? It’s freezing!), because her pajamas are way too cute to be ashamed of, but it’s a near thing. For some reason.

Now that the words have left her lips, she can’t take them back, and so she finishes the story about how Atsu - one of her classmates teased her mercilessly for the entire month, while she refused to be flustered, because, again, why would she be embarrassed of her cute little pajamas? He would wish to have something as cute as that.

Endou hasn’t even twitched by the end of it — his head is still buried in his legs, his fingers are still digging into his shins. Nae bristles, a bit offended. That’s one of her best party stories! And he hasn’t even bothered to fake a laugh!

So she’ll have to pull out the big guns, huh? Endou isn’t one for dilly dallying funny stories, it seems. Doesn’t matter: Nae’s a funny girl, and she has thousands of funny stories for him! Well, maybe not thousands. But a pretty big number! He better prepare himself to  _ enjoy _ .

“Once, I tried to kick a ball but my shoe went flying and hit the goalie in the face...” she says, and tells the story. Endou doesn’t react.

“Once, Atsu - One of my friends pranked me. Tried to, I mean — he put glitter in all of my clothes. Although he wasn’t much of a friend if he didn’t know I would absolutely adore that new look, but well, whatever. Anyways...” she says, and tells the story. Endou doesn’t react.

“Once, I dreamt I had failed P.E. — my best subject, by the way — and went to class crying and screaming and almost hit the teacher…” she says, and tells the story. Endou doesn’t react.

“Once, my dog bit and tore the butt of my backpack without me knowing, and while I walked to class all my books fell out…” she says, and tells the story. Endou doesn’t - wait! His mouth twitches, and his eyes get warmer. He - smiles a tiny but honest smile. 

...Yay! Yay, yay, yay!  _ That _ ’s a job well done! And by her! Yay!

The door opens, and Nae’s eyes flicker to it. To her: Aki is the one who opened it, and now she’s staring at Nae with a mix of confusion and relief. If Aki’s here, that means Nae doesn’t have to do anything anymore, because she and Endou are best friends and best friends just know how to fix these things.

( _ But what about her and _ —)

And so, Nae finally unsticks her ass from the wet floor (and shivers, because wow, she is cold). She walks to the door, to leave them privacy — not before giving Endou a head pat, because everyone deserves one. She doesn’t linger too much after that; just wishes Aki good luck and skips away, back to training. She’s gone like one day without touching a football, and she has to recuperate the lost time!

The others welcome her into practice with open arms and more cheer than she honestly expected, after everything that’s happened. Even Kogure is happy, although he hides his smile quickly when her eyes flicker to him. She knows his heart is happy, though, and that - makes her happy too. 

This is what a team is. And Raimon will never be Hakuren, but… they make her feel welcome all the same.

At some point during the training match, it stops raining. At that moment, Nae stops, looks at the sky. Smiles. This means Endou is finally okay, she knows, and glancing to the rooftop of that one building confirms it. Endou is there, looking at them with pride and happiness and renewed energy, clutching the plastic fence. Something content twirls inside her, at the knowledge that she’s helped him back a little.

The moment lasts until a football slams in her face. 

“Oh my gosh,” Rika (the one who shot it) gasps, running towards her. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”

Nae can’t do anything but laugh through the uncomfortable weight in her chest. Of course she’s okay. Things are finally looking up, and she’s helped with it!

(Of course, not everyone has been solved: they still have Aliea Academy to defeat, she still has to settle matters with Shirou, they have to find the Flame Striker… among a lot of other things. All in all, a pretty long shopping list of duties they still haven’t done.

This doesn't mean that this is not noteworthy — it’s a start, and it feels pretty good to be part of it.)


	6. IV: Okinawa

Nae has never been on a cruise, and, let it be said, the experience is  _ amazing _ .

The wind against your face, the sunlight against your skin, the drifting salt on your mouth: those are new sensations Nae has discovered this morning. Okay, barring the salt one, she’d felt those before, but. It all takes new meaning when you’re on a boat. Life’s problems fade away into meaningless nothings.

Heh. How poetic.

But there’s something bothering her; that annoying weight on her chest is still dragging her back. Of course, the weight’s name is Shirou — full name: Shirou And Their Still-Ongoing (Maybe?) Fight. 

And she’s a proactive girl; if it depended solely on her, she would speak with him and talk it out with him. Apologise for not being understanding enough and for forcing her help on people who didn’t want it, and hope he reciprocates with an apology of his own. Then, all would be solved, for better or for worse.

However, it doesn’t depend solely on her, and Shirou’s been holed up in his room since they arrived here. The only window opportunity she’s had to talk to him is the way between the caravan and here, and she was speaking with Haruna then, exchanging some tips about dealing with Kogure.

The scenery is beautiful, but it’s kind of ruined with the thought. Maybe she could go to speak with him, see if she has any luck and he lets her into his room. Or they could speak through the door, she guesses.

And so, she pushes herself away from the railing. Rika and Touko, her sight-seeing partners, look questioningly at her. “I’m going to - “  _ the bathroom _ , she’s about to say, but catches herself. She won’t allow herself to become a liar, even if it’s easier, “ - Shirou’s room. See if there’s any luck, you know.”

Touko nods, something close to understanding in her eyes. Rika smiles at her, somewhat pitying —  _ she probably thinks this is a lovers’ spat _ , Nae reflects, with a surprising amount of fondness — and turns back to the scenery.

The insides of the cruise are empty, for all that the deck was bursting with noise and laughter and life; kind of a lonely sensation, if you ask her. But then again, the point she’s trying to make is that there’s no one here to ask her, so.

She hopes Shirou likes this kind of silence, because God knows she doesn’t. And if he has any good taste and thinks like her, then being stuck here probably isn’t good for his mental health. Who knows what his thoughts are telling him, now that there’s no one to contradict them.

She knocks on his door, but he doesn’t answer. Predictable.

It’s two in the afternoon, and he’s been sleeping for the last two days, so he’s probably awake on his bed, trying to fall asleep but unable to. She knows the feeling. Even if he really is asleep, her next two knocks are loud enough to wake up a sloth bear, so yeah. He just doesn’t want to talk.

And Nae’s learnt from their previous fight that she shouldn’t try to force her help on people who haven’t asked for it, so she doesn’t press anymore. She should go away and left him to his musings. She really should do that, at least if she’s trying to stick to her new principles. But - the moment she takes a step away from the door, her chest tightens — her lungs and her heart.

Thanks, instinct, for almost giving her a heart attack. 

But okay, she gets it. Do something else, one last try and the game’s over. And you can’t force him to do anything, because you’re not a hypocrite. Got it, Nae? You may not be good at school or at memorisation, but this is a simple set of rules.

When there’s a door, there are few things that she can do; she can’t even comfort him physically in the non-sexual sense! Really, if Nae were him, she would have gone out and hugged her best friend — in this case, him. 

But he’s not Nae. And so, she starts to talk.

“You know…” she starts, and trails off. What exactly is he upset about? Like, this obviously isn’t just because of her; their fight was a secondary effect of his frustration. ...Eh, she’ll have to take a shot in the dark. “You know that - what Hitomiko said about packing our things isn’t true, right? Well, it may be true if we  _ really _ mess up, but we’re not that bad, so.” She shrugs. “Not gonna happen.”

She clears her throat. Wow, this literally speaking to a wall business is pretty weird. She doesn’t get how voice actors do it. “You’re - we’re. You’re not going to get kicked out of the team.  _ Especially _ if you get out of there and get back to normal. You shouldn’t do that if you don’t feel up to it, of course, but I’m just saying that the way you play - “ her mind shows her that match against Epsilon, when he stole the ball from his own teammates, “ well, the way you play when you’re in a moderately healthy state of mind - it’s good. Like, you’re a good player.”

There’s some muttering on the other side of the door. Smiling, Nae leans to press her ear on it, and asks him to repeat it. 

He doesn’t, but Nae refuses to let her smile fall. At least, she’s managed to get a reaction! That’s way more than she came expecting, honestly. She’s at least confirmed that he’s awake and listening.

She knocks once more on the door for good measure, bids him goodbye, and leaves, a bit more happy than how she arrived. 

Shirou tentatively comes out at dinnertime. Everybody stops talking the moment he appears under the doorframe, staring at him with a mixture of feelings: surprise, happiness, confusion, worry… In Nae’s case, everything, but because she’s an optimist, happiness is more prevalent.

Shirou fidgets under the attention, and it’s as if everyone suddenly remembers that staring is rude, and, more so, in silence. Nae at least certainly does, but, unlike the others, she doesn’t manage to tear her eyes away and resume a previous conversation. Not that she was having any; she was too busy thinking, depressed, she’s the same age as their visitor, Tsunami, but only her (and her father; she should call him - haven’t done that this week) knows it.

Where will Shirou sit? She left a spot to her left especially for him, but honestly, she wasn’t expecting him to come out or him to take it. There’s also a spot next to Tachimukai, and while Nae is pretty and nice and a Princess™ and everything good in the world, Tachimukai is also that, but better. (He’s a ball of pure sunshine.)

Nae knows who she’d sit next to. So, don’t get too excited, Nae! Who’d want to sit between her and Kogure? That’s just asking to get pranked as collateral damage!

But then - Shirou starts to walk towards her, toward the empty seat next to her, and she’s, like, is he taking the longest detour ever to get to Tachimukai? But his butt plops down on the cushion next to her, and that makes the truth undeniable: he’s chosen to sit here.

Nae smiles, and throws a grape into her mouth as a celebration. She’s never eaten grapes before, not until now, and the flavour pools in her mouth. Delicious!

She doesn’t engage with Shirou in conversation — or she’s waiting to do it, she still hasn’t decided — because everybody and their mother has decided that wow, they should all be buddy-buddies with him! And that starts with a conversation, of course!

Shirou’s left fending three people at once with a polite smile. For someone who hasn’t spoken in like three days — and it’s clear in his voice, in how rough it is, in how he stops and stumbles when talking — he’s a pretty good conversationalist.

Eventually, though, the conversations die, and everyone turns to Tsunami, who is a wild box of constant chit-chatter. There’s something about him… Maybe it’s in the way his gestures are so wide, or his face is so open, or his voice is so clear and soothing, perfect for a surfer. Anyways, the point is that it’s impossible not to listen to him.

“...and the wave was so, so,  _ so  _ enormous,” he’s saying when Nae tunes in, and splays his arms wide, “and my heart was pounding in my chest, like, BA-DUM, BA-DUM, and I knew I had to try and take it.”

“Did you?” Tachimukai chimes, starry-eyed. Nae buries the jealousy under a smile. 

Tsunami bursts into laughter. “No way! It was way too big for little six-year-old me! Now, however… I think I’d have a chance! Anyways...” He leans in, conspiratorial. “Has any of you city children surfed before?” Although the words are, frankly, kind of a bit rude, she’s not offended in the least; he’s  _ that  _ charismatic.

“Me! Me!” she pipes in, raising her hand excitedly. She’s the only one, which, like, what? No one else has surfed before? Really? Not even to try it during the hot summers?

“Yeah?” Tsunami grins, and in his eyes, it says clearly that he’s found his soulmate. ...Okay, that’s a bit dumb; this is Okinawa, there’s probably thousands of people here who surf. But he’s happy that she surfs, at least.

She grins back. “Yeah! One of my friends — well, a football team of my friends, more like — invited me to their homeland, an island in the middle of nowhere. A beautiful island,” she adds, because even if Norika isn’t here, she has an ear for when people are disrespecting Inakunijima. “We played in the beach and then she taught me how to surf!”

“Are you any good at it?” Kogure chimes in, with the eyes of someone who’s expecting her to say she’s the worst surfer ever.

“Nope!” she says, proud. She would have wanted to say she’s a surfing genius, to scrub the fact on Kogure’s face, but alas! The truth has to come before her dignity or her need to drag his metaphorical ass through the ground.

Kogure snickers. “Of course. I don’t know why I asked!”

“The important thing is that you had fun!” Tsunami says at the same time. Nae nods, solemn, because those are wise words to live by. “And to feel the waves tickling your skin, the sea foam caressing your face…”

He dissolves into a poetic ramble about the ethereal wonders of surfing and the sea. Nae half listens, but she also half nots, because she’s a science girl, not a literature one, and she’s never had any taste for poetry.

A hand tugs on the sleeve of her jacket. A hand that comes from her left. 

She turns her head, lips slightly parted, to look at Shirou, who’s gazing back with unreadable eyes and pursed lips. Raising her eyebrows (not too much, because she doesn’t want to offend him), she asks, “What’s up?” Wait. She still hasn’t apologised, has she? Stupid Nae! You have to focus a bit more! “By the way, I’m—”

“—sorry about the other day,” they say, at the exact same time. Nae’s lips tug up so strongly and quickly that they are impossible to stop, even if she had wanted to try. There’s also a small smile on Shirou’s his face.

“You’re forgiven,” she answers gracefully, grasping Shirou’s wrist to take the point across.

Although there’s a jittery look in his eyes, one that’s been here since he came into the room, Shirou’s smile is kind, when he answers. “You, too.”

And with that, they resume eating. Nothing really changes — Shirou is as silent as ever, and they don’t engage in conversation during the rest of the dinner. But - a silent barrier has been lifted, one that she hadn’t noticed had been there until it wasn’t.

And even if Shirou’s problems still hasn’t been solved — Nae reluctantly notices his shaking hands in his grip on his chopsticks, or his vacant, distracted gaze when (he thinks) nobody’s looking at him — this is at least a step up.

She hopes.

So, they came to Okinawa to look for the Frame Striker (Gouenji), and, on the next morning, they finally get to it. Shirou and Nae are teamed up again, because the team hasn’t learnt from their mistakes; they will waste a lot of time with tourism! Honestly.

But then, it turns out that they are divided into groups of three people, and that they have to go with Domon, arguably one of the most responsible players of this team, because apparently Raimon has learnt from their mistakes, but just a little bit.

Nae’s eager to take him to the dark side.

“So, Domon-kun,” she begins, a smile plastered on her face, during the middle of the search. They are on the residential area of the island — a beautiful place filled with a myriad of people, which will make this search impossible. Domon, the only one who knows Gouenji from this group, doesn’t seem to think so, but eh. Nae’ll believe it when she sees it. “How was your day?”

Considering they’ve gotten up like, an hour ago, this isn’t the smartest question ever, and Domon seems to think so, by his answer of, “Uh...”

“Mine’s been fine,” she says, and is about to say something flirty ( _ now that I’ve seen you today _ ), but aborts the motion. It’s too soon. “Although I’m still pretty sleepy…” She yawns, for good measure, although she has to force it out a little. 

“Yeah, me too,” Domon answers, smiling. He doesn’t look sleepy at all. Is he a compulsive liar, or just really good at hiding his sleepiness? “And my day’s been fine, too. Thanks for asking.”

They get enveloped by a comfortable silence. Usually, Nae would try to break it, but she’s tired enough to leave it, for now. Shirou, who truly is sleepy, remains a constant presence at their side, only making any noise to yawn or rub his eyes. It’s — and this is painful to admit — kind of cute. It’s on moments like this when she can grasp why so many people of Hakuren are in love with Shirou, if this is what he’s like during the first class. She would be, too, if she didn’t have any taste.

Nae manages to convince Domon to go look for seashells (there’s no need to convince Shirou; he’s asleep on his feet). It’s while she’s admiring a hermit crab that they come across the Flame Striker. Or, more exactly, he comes upon them.

“Nagumo?” Nae gasps, staring at the fallen boy. 

Apparently, he wasn’t looking down while he promenaded the beach and had tripped with Shirou, who had lain down in the sand the moment it became clear they’d be here a while. If she had been looking at that instead of at the shell, she’d have bursted out laughing. As it is now, she’s just confused.

Nagumo gets up, pats his thighs, drags a hand through his face to remove the sand, and glares, not even a little bit embarrassed. Nae’s lips twitch — that’s her Nagumo, uncaring even through ridiculousness.

He cocks his hip, a calm hand resting on it. “Hm, so Gran was a liar. No surprise there.” Stepping towards her — towards  _ her _ , especifically her —, his face turns darker and darker, a dangerous smirk adorns his face. “You know our names. Why is it?”

Should she feel threatened? Because the most she can manage right now is amusement. “Why wouldn’t I? They’re just - ” She gestures wordlessly at him. “ - written in your faces.”

Nagumo’s eyebrow twitches, smile instantly falling. He moves his face closer so that their noses are almost touching. There’s sand stuck to his eyelashes. “You know as well as I do that that’s impossible.”

“Is it?” Nae grins.

A wordless growl. If he gets any closer, their lips are going to meet for real. She doesn’t take a step back, because he would mistake it for fear, and that would make him braver with his advances. “Are you kidding me? Do you think this is a joke? Our names—”

“You’re from Aliea, right?” Domon’s voice, her current favourite voice, comes to the rescue. Nae’s sure that he already knows he’s from Aliea (he couldn’t have spelled it more clearly if he tried), so this is to get him off her. Her saviour. “If you know Gran.”

Nagumo steps back, turns around (phew!), and though she can’t see his face, there’s probably a dismissive glance in there. “Yeah,” he admits, uncaring. “And I want to crush you under my heel before Gazel does, so… Match tomorrow. On the stadium of this town’s school.” He turns back to smirk at her. “Maybe if I destroy your spirit, you’ll tell me how you know our names, hm?”

Nae bristles. “For your information, Genesis absolutely destroyed us and my spirit is as fine as ever!”

“You - didn’t have to put it like that…” Domon says with an embarrassed smile. From his place down on the sand (he hasn’t gotten up, not even after Nagumo tripped on him), Shirou shakes a hand in agreement.

Nae refuses to tolerate anything other than accepting reality as it is. “Well, it was what happened, so I’ll say it as it is. Genesis destroyed us, crushed us, pummeled us, wrecked us, ruined us, demolished us, annihilated us, ravaged us to the ground, trashed us, quashed us - “ She gasps for air. “ - butchered us, exterminated us, liquidated us, obliterated us, made us see stars—”

“We got it, Shiratoya.”

“Genesis?” Nagumo frowns. “Genesis still hasn’t been decided, and if it was,  _ my _ team would be.”

Nae shrugs. “That’s what…  _ Gran _ ’s team introduced themselves as.”

Nagumo’s face darkens. “I see… Don’t forget about tomorrow.” And with that, he vanishes. Without saying goodbye. Rude. She wasn’t expecting anything else from him, but still. Rude. 

They stay in silence for a long second, the only noise being Shirou’s breathing (he’d apparently fallen asleep at some point). Then, Nae grins and glances at Domon out of the corner of her eye. “Welp. Let’s go inform the rest of the team, no?”

Domon sighs. “Yeah.”

The team takes the news well. Most of them don’t even bat an eye, and the ones who do (Tachimukai and Rika) only do that because they haven’t been here long enough. They’ve been playing against Aliea in every island, so the match here had to come sooner or later. It’s sooner, which is kind of a problem because they still haven’t found Gouenji, but eh. They’ll get through it.

Nae has an inkling that Nagumo was the Flame Striker they were searching for — after all, what was the chance that there were  _ two _ aces who used fire in an island full of water? — but Endou refuses to listen to her sound logic. If it’s because of refusing to accept reality or because his instincts tell him otherwise, she’d never know.

It doesn’t really matter, though. They have to stay on Okinawa for the match, and she has no problems with doing tourism with Shirou under the guise of searching for an unfindable person.

Before playing against Nagumo’s team, they decide to play against Oumihara, the local football team. And when she says before, she means an hour or so before; not a day or something like that. Nae finds this to be a supremely stupid decision, because they’ll be tired for the match against Aliea, but what does she know? She’s not a coach.

Thankfully, she remains on the bench, while Shirou is their main forward, along with Rika. It’s probably to give him and Nae a little time apart, to spread their wings and all, but she’s not going to complain, because it suits her objective of not tiring out before an important match.

Unsurprisingly, Raimon wins. Oumihara is good, but not  _ that _ good.

And then, the atmosphere turns colder, seemingly out of nowhere. Already familiar with that sensation, Nae turns her head to look at the goal — for some reason, Aliea always appears there or in the center of the stadium. And given that the center is full of people…

Not even five seconds later, Nagumo appears, with his team in tow. 

And so does Suzuno. 

They glare at each other while Nae — and everyone, really — blinks.

“What are you doing here,” Suzuno begins, crossing his arms, “flame for brains?”

Nagumo’s bloodthirsty grin has more than a tinge of fury. “I came here to play a match! So don’t get in the way.” His grin turns lopsided, into a sort of smirk. “Say what, I’ll even let you watch, so that you can  _ learn _ .”

“You’re the one who has to learn here,” Suzuno retorts, coolly. His finger twitches on his arm, betraying his anger. “Father told  _ us _ , my team, to destroy Raimon. So you should leave. Now.”

“Well.” Nagumo raises his chin, his nose. “Even if father didn’t order us to play, he always was all for initiative. And besides, how can I know that he really did tell you to play? You’re probably lying to me to steal my prey!”

Behind him, Nagumo’s team voices their agreement. Immediately, Suzuno’s team reacts and protests. They bicker under the perplexed eyes of both Raimon and Oumihara, Suzuno and Nagumo more than anyone.

“Why would I  _ lie _ ?”

“To steal my prey, duh.”

“It’s not your prey—”

“Says you. It so is—”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is!”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is!”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is!”

“No.”

“Yes!”

“Captain,” a girl from Suzuno’s team interjects. Kurara or something like that, she thinks. Blue-haired, petite and with nice eyes. Eyes which are currently glaring disdainful holes into Nagumo, “ and  _ you _ . We’re not going to agree in this century. Why don’t we decide who plays against them - “ She points at Raimon without even looking, as if they were discardable pieces of trash. Nae frowns. “ - by playing our own match? The winner gets to destroy Raimon.”

Nagumo looks interested by the idea, but he also looks ready to refuse on principle. Probably because the one who suggested it is a member of his mortal enemy’s team. Really. And here Nae was getting illusions about seeing — and not playing — a nice match,, for once in this life.

Thankfully, a boy from Nagumo’s team comes to the rescue with an evil smirk. Netsuha. “That’s a great idea,” he drawls, in a way that makes it clear that he only wants to play to crush Suzuno’s team, and nothing else.

The aura of Nagumo and his team turns darker, callous, at those words. Even Nagumo himself is cackling like a maniac. “Yeah, that’s right! We agree to that idea!”

Suzuno hmmm...s, tapping one finger on his arm. “Good plan, Clara,” he says, glancing at the blue-haired girl, and she nods. Clara. Yeah, now she remembers. She’s spoken to her a few times.

At the implicit agreement, almost everyone Nagumo’s team roars with hunger. Suzuno’s team stares at them impassively, not even twitching at the sudden noise. Ugh, it would be nice to be like that — at least that way, her heart wouldn’t have almost exploded out of her chest right now.

While their busy doing their… thing, a red-haired girl from Nagumo’s team — the one that merited the ‘almost’ two statements ago — comes towards them, a slightly annoyed expression on her face.

“Move,” she says — snaps, orders, commands, more like. This time, Nae doesn’t even have an inkling of her name. “We’re going to use the pitch.”

Nae looks at her feet, which turn out to be standing on a patch of grass. Everybody around her does the same. Heh, they really are slow, huh? They (or at least her) have gotten so carried away by both teams’ antics that they’ve forgotten all around their environment. How… charismatic. 

The red-haired girl shooshes them towards the stands, and she leaves towards her team with a last disdainful look and a “watch and learn — maybe then you’ll have a slight chance of winning against us next.”

As she walks away, Nae focuses on her gait: light, quick, elegant, noiseless. It speaks of a whole lot of training, which, considering the strength of previous Aliea teams and the fact that this girl’s captain is one of the biggest perfectionist ever, is no surprise. Bad news for them, though.

The match that comes after is the most exciting Nae’s seen in a long time. 

It’s the closest one she’s ever seen in her life, for sure. Prominence scores a goal, and seconds later, Diamond Dust ties the score. Suzuno steals the ball, and between one blink and the other, Nagumo’s gotten it back. If someone dribbles, soon another will have stolen the ball from them. And so, the score goes like this: 0-0, 1-0, 1-1, 1-2, 2-2, 3-2, 3-3.

Everybody’s on the edge of their seats by the start of the extra time. Some are simply enjoying the match, while others (KIdou, basically; oh, and Hitomiko) are analysing the player’s every move. Nae finds herself in a weird mix ot the two: she’s trying to enjoy a great match, but she can’t help but notice slight details in the way the players move, the players act, and dreading the match against them. Whatever the team is.

The extra time finishes with no one scoring another goal. Prominence whines and complains and stomps on the floor, but Nagumo points at Suzuno, who is as cool as ever, and screams, “I’ll pummel you in the penalties!”

And then they proceed to do the longest penalties Nae’s ever experiences. There’s been a lot of beaten records in this match, she notices. 

They keep on watching as the penalties roll on and no one’s managed to score (poor goalies, by the way; the tension must be insurmountable). There are times when someone scores and it seems the match is going to finally ends, but they’re short chimeras — the shooter from the other team manages to score in their turn, and the score returns to normal: a tie.

Sigh.

By the third round of penalties, the match has lost its charm, and almost no one is paying attention anymore — Kidou, who has an ability to concentrate many would kill for, is the only one remaining. A true MVP, really.

Meanwhile, the mortals (Nae is among them) have taken their attention to other endeavours. Endou is counting goals under his breath, like one would count sheeps. Tachimukai is imitating him. Kogure is writing in that notebook of his. Domon and Ichinose are speaking in low voices. Kageyama is eating. Megane is playing a game on a PSP. The managers have vanished. Shirou and Touko have fallen asleep on Nae’s shoulders, and Rika has pretended to fall asleep on Ichinose’s.

And Hitomiko? After a brief search (without moving an inch, of course; no need to disturb the sleeping angels here), she finds Hitomiko is getting up of her seat. Nae eyes her curiously, as she examines the team just like Nae had done seconds earlier. 

“Let’s go,” she says, making everyone snap to attention. The fourth round of penalties continues in the background. “We have seen enough of both team’s abilities to form a strategy against them. There is nothing more for us to do in Okinawa.”

“And the match?” Tachimukai pipes in, a bit meekly. Aw, is he embarrassed of moderately defying his coach? Adorable.

“We are fleeing,” Hitomiko answers, with a straight face. Considering they're throwing away their honour, she really, really shouldn’t have one.

Not that Nae cares about any of those things; she’d quite like a hot bad and an early bed right now, and fleeing is the best way to achieve it. But Endou clearly does, and his loud protest almost wakes up Shirou and Touko.

“We still haven’t found Gouenji!” On second thought, maybe he doesn’t care about honour. He adopts inspirational posture number one, the one with the clenched fist and the bent elbow. Nae shushes him, shooting a telling look towards the weights on her shoulders. Endou has the decency to look vaguely guilty, and lower his voice to say, “I’m sure he’s here!”

Hitomiko grimaces. She clearly doesn’t think the same. “Well, if he is here, he better appear between here and the caravan. We are not going to wait for him.”

And then, she starts walking towards the caravan, under the glare of all original Raimon members, the dubious glare of Endou (she has a feeling the boy doesn’t know how to be properly angry when things don’t threaten football directly), and the probably glare of Kidou. 

Nae offers the sleeping angels a dejected glance. They’re so cute and warm like this… She doesn’t want to wake them up. But (sigh) there’s no way she can carry a body, let alone two. And so, reluctantly, she shakes them awake. Delicately, of course, because if she can enjoy the moment a bit more, she will.

(This reminds her to that one time, when Atsu—)

“Wait for who?” An unknown, slightly cocky voice comes from the railings. After a bit of mental searching, the voice turns out to not be so unknown; isn’t it, coincidentally, Gouenji’s? And Nae gasps, because  _ no _ , there’s no way it’s possible. There’s no way life is so convenient. This can’t be happening.

She turns around, slowly so as not to ruin the moment and, just as the boy is lowering his hood, she sees - yes! It is Gouenji! Life is beautiful to have allowed this moment to happen! Now Hitomiko’ll have to trust more in destiny — or, at least, in Endou’s frighteningly correct hunches.

“Gouenji!” Endou exclaims, grinning from ear to ear. “You’re almost late!”

Gouenji smirks, with certainly not a small amount of fondness. “I’m getting better, aren’t I?” And Nae blinks, because - is there something she’s missing here? This exchange seems suspiciously… domestic. It’s not her business, she guesses, but she’s still curious. “Wasn’t there a match?”

“Was,” Domon says, wryly. “We’re about to flee from it.”

Gouenji doesn’t look impressed, but he doesn’t comment. Well, maybe that last part is less of his choice and more of Endou grabbing his arm and dragging him towards the caravan so quickly he doesn’t have any chance to protest.

As they walk (Nae holding Shirou and Touko’s hands, because they’re still sleepy enough that they don’t know where they’re going or who they are), Nae chances a look at Hitomiko. The coach looks conflicted: on one hand, like she’s eaten a sour lemon; on the other, happy. Happy eventually wins, though, partly because she’s not as bad a person as she wants to make them believe, and partly because - look at them! It’s impossible not to be happy when you see a reunion like this.

Endou is vibrating from happiness, but he’s clearly holding himself back from saying anything until they arrive to the caravan, where they will be safe for as much rambling as he wants to do. Meanwhile, Gouenji is catching up with Kidou in low voices, and although their expressions don’t vary much from resting faces, Nae’s been in the team long enough to know when Kidou is ecstatic. 

She smiles, because again, it’s impossible not to. Squeezes her own friends hands tighter, and walks in silence, listening to the low tones of reunited friends.

In the caravan, predictably enough, Endou bursts. He introduces Gouenji to the team, and the team to Gouenji. Shirou’s hands curl into themselves when Endou introduces him.

Eventually, the two friends (?) start talking between them, the rest of the world forgotten. It’s audible enough that Nae could hear it if she wanted, but she doesn’t want to. Even if they aren’t speaking about anything serious, she doesn’t want to, like, intrude or something like that. Some things deserve to be private, for only two people to know.

(Meanwhile, Prominence and Diamond Dust are still intensely disputing the tenth round of penalties. Still tied. This can’t be. This can’t be! It’s impossible that two teams have the exact same level, even in luck. There should have been one misstep, one badly kicked ball, that tipped off the scales.

But Prominence and Diamond Dust live to surprise, and this is no exception. And so, off to the tenth round they go. Gran leans against the wall. Sometimes, things like this make him doubt if one of them should be Genesis, but he swiftly squashes the thought. Doubt has no place in him.

Burn stares down Diamond Dust’s goalkeeper, Beluga, with his mightiest glare. Beluga is blind, though, and even if he weren’t, he has a bandana covering his eyes. No matter how much he wants to, Burn’s glare doesn’t convey any presence, and so to Beluga, it’s not there.

Burn looks at the ball, licks his lips. Beluga has stopped five of his shots, not stopped four. Gran can see the gears turning on his head:  _ if I score now, he won’t have won against me, and I’d have won against his team because my goalie is awesome and there’s no way he’ll let another shot of Gazel’s in. _

Yes. Gran would bet on it being word for word.

But as Burn’s foot lifts of the ground, Lean’s scream stops it. 

“Wait!”

“What is it, Lean?” Burn asks, annoyed, It’s not uncommon to see him annoyed with one of his team, but this is a bit more annoyed than usual.

Still, Lean doesn’t cower, not a little bit. She’s always been one of the most suited for Burn, in the same way Ulvida is suited for him (in the platonic sense, of course) — like two puzzle pieces who don’t fit together but are made to be by a clever child with scissors. That’s not a flattering analogy for Father, but there’s some part of his mind that couldn’t help it.

Gran squashes it, too. He can’t let disrespect fester.

“Raimon isn’t here!” Oh, yes. Lean was speaking before his mind went into tangents. Wait. What does she mean Raimon isn’t here?

_ That Raimon isn’t here _ , the part of his mind that sounds suspiciously like Ulvida quipes, very helpfully, as Gran’s eyes flicker to the stands where Endou - where Raimon used to sit at. Used being the key word. 

How can he not have noticed? This is unbecoming for the captain of Genesis (for no matter what Burn and Gazel say, his team is Genesis); he has to be watchful at all times, or else someone could sneak up on him and steal his title. And with someone, he means Prominence and Diamond Dust.

He had been too focused on the match — couldn’t even help it. Really, Ulvida is right: Endou has been a disastrous influence on him. This adds another reluctant fact to the list of Why To Exterminate Raimon, right under  _ because Father said so _ .

Back in the field, Burn screams himself hoarse and Gazel facepalms. Prominence is full of “it can’t be”s and “how dare they”s, while Diamond Dust is silent in their embarrassment.

Gran takes this as his cue to enter the scene, and drag the two captains by the ears, back to Father, as he was intending to do before stopping to see the match. He’ll give them a suitable punishment for failing their mission.)

Nae can’t sleep. 

That’s not something she’s used to. True, since arriving to this world, uncertainties have taken the opportunity to sneak up on her and leave her with sleepless nights, but it’s still not often enough for her to get used to it. She’s always been more of a sleep-your-problems-away type.

She turns around to stare at Shirou through the faint light. He’s sleeping peacefully — and don’t be envious, Nae, no matter how much you want to — in the seat-turned-sort-of-bed next to hers. She should really stop staring — it’s really creepy, after all, and she doesn’t want to imagine someone doing the same to her.

And she’s really about to turn around (or at least force her eyes closed) when Shirou’s eyes open, and they’re bright orange.

She blinks, opens her mouth to scream, but a hand muffles it so that it’s almost inaudible. 

_ Who are you?! _ , she wants to ask, but can’t, with her mouth blocked. This is Shirou’s... what? Alter ego? Split personality? Ghost possessing him? Bad side of his personality that somehow manifests with orange features? Nae has been holding herself from asking, figuring it would be awkward and overstepping her boundaries, but if it’s (they’re? he’s? She’ll go with he’s) he’s kidnapping her mouth, then she feels entitled to it.

And so, she does the smart thing, and licks his palm. The boy retracts his hand, a disgusted grimace on his face. Nae grins at him.

She doesn’t really know how — if to start this conversation, so she doesn’t. Besides, as stated earlier, she doesn’t even know who she’s speaking to. (Even if the way of speaking, of behaving, of gesturing, is very alike someone she knows’s.)

Nope. Absolutely no clue!

“Why were you staring at Shirou?” Shirou (because there’s no way he isn’t Shirou) begins after a long second of silence, speaking in third person for whatever reason. Three a.m. isn’t good for Shirou’s mental health, huh? Shirou’s going crazy. Or maybe it is her. Mmm…

“I wasn’t staring,” she says, because it was only for a few seconds  _ tops _ . At Shirou’s disbelieving glance, she corrects, “Okay, maybe I was a bit staring, but just a bit. Annnnd that was because I couldn’t sleep.”

Shirou narrows his eyes at her, distrusting. They are so unnaturally orange that they find a way to reflect light, even when swallowed in almost complete darkness. Honestly, if it weren’t really, really,  _ really _ creepy, she would say it’s cute.

...Okay, it  _ is  _ cute. But the thought isn’t going to leave her head, or Shirou would tease her mercilessly for the rest of her life.

On the other hand, why would Shirou tease her? He’s never done that in this world, and in the other he did it very seldomly, only when, in his words, it was irresistible.  _ He was kind of an asshole _ , she thinks, and ugh, the thought is fond. Yet another think that isn’t going to leave her brain!

Anyways, teasing is way more typical of Atsu—

“Why couldn’t you sleep?” Atsu - Shirou (haha, what a silly almost-mistake) says. 

And there’s a lot of things she could answer to that question:  _ I am worried about not being good enough for the team, now that Gouenji is here _ ;  _ I am distressed, because maybe we won’t win against Aliea, and all the people form there are sad and lying through their teeth and I want to help them but I can’t, because I promised myself I wouldn’t help those who didn’t ask me to; I’m disquieted, because my friends here don’t know me, and I don’t really know them either; I’m  _ terrified _ of not going back to my world, of not even knowing how I got here. _

All of those are very valid answers, but honestly, too personal for this conversation — it’s not light, per se, but it’s definitely not heavy enough to drop one of these bombs, even if  _ Shirou _ has prompted her to. Just because  **_Shirou_ ** doesn’t care about the consequences of his questions doesn’t mean she doesn’t. 

In the end, all she answers with is—

“I’m nervous.”

Atsu -  **_Shirou_ ** , ugh - nods sagely, as if she knows exactly the feeling. But then he answers with, “I’ve never been nervous in all my life,” and she knows he’s a lying liar.

“Really?” she asks, and her lips are tugging up despite herself. “Because I happen to know for a fact a moment when you’ve been nervous.”

He scowls. “You don’t! There’s no way you were there—” He cuts himself off, and squints at her. “Did you plan that?”

Ah, kids. How easy to manipulate. She grins, showing more teeth than necessary. “Maybe.”

“What do you mean  _ maybe _ ? It’s a yes or not question!” he says — er, screams. Someone (she thinks it’s Kogure) sleepily shushes him, and he purses his lips, in an almost embarrassed pout, and repeats, in a quieter voice, “It’s a yes or no question.”

“What did you say? I didn’t hear you.”

“I  _ said _ —” His voice starts to rise again, and Nae can’t hold back the snort. He pauses, blinks. Glares at her. “I hate you.”

She giggles, ignoring how it’s a little wet. “I love you, too.”

They speak well into the night, falling into familiar banter, even though they don’t know each other, not really, no matter what the back of her mind is screaming at her. She doesn’t know that part of - Shirou, and that part doesn’t really know her.

The next morning, she wakes up with her memory of the long night a haze. Ignoring Shirou’s odd looks, she passes it all off as a dream. Because there’s no way that it could have been more than that. Right? There’s no way  _ he _ is inside of Shirou, otherwise.

Yeah, she knows with certainty — too much, even. It had to have been a dream. 


	7. VII: Tokyo

The caravan ride to Tokyo is pretty uneventful, even though it’s the longest time they’ve ever been holed in here. Something about Prominence and Diamond Dust seems to have set Hitomiko on edge, and she pulls a face every time they have to stop for something, be it food, water, gas, or even going to the bathroom!

It’s pretty over the top, that reaction. But Nae isn’t going to be the one to tell her. She appreciates her life. Besides, when Natsumi tried to protest, Hitomiko’s disdain was so palpable that the proud girl wilted. Natsumi: wilting. If  _ that _ doesn’t say it all, nothing does.

As such, the ride is practically uninterrupted. It if weren’t for Kabeyama, who just  _ had _ to go to the bathroom after one of Kogure’s pranks don’t you understand coach this is serious, they would have arrived at Tokyo without pausing — not even for sleeping, because Hitomiko and Furukabu switched.

Nae doesn’t understand the urgency until they are in Tokyo, with Suzuno and Nagumo’s newest team, Chaos, staring down at her. Why they’d fused their teams when neither of them has lost against Raimon, Nae will never know—

(Somewhere far, far away, Gran sneezes.)

—but then again, she doesn’t really care. Okay, well, she cares a bit, because this means they’re going to fight against an enemy allegedly stronger than Genesis - Gaia - whatever Tatsuya’s team is called. And call her a pessimist, but they aren’t ready, not yet. They haven’t really started their final training! Tachimukai still doesn’t control Mugen The Hand! Endou hasn’t advanced as a goalkeeper yet!

Of course, she’s not going to show her doubts to the group. In the small chance that they win, showing doubt would ruin that. And so, when Endou smiles encouragingly and says something about the power of friendship, Nae is the first to raise her fist and  _ yeah! _

The rest of the team follows the gesture, too, and in doing that, they gain a little more confidence. It’s not too much, but you know what they say about a little going a long way and all that. 

Of course, that saying would work better if Hitomiko also trusted a little, instead of staring at them like they’re aliens (haha) for daring to believe they can win against the poor odds, but, eh. They’ll make it work.

It’s during the rushed strategy meeting that it happens. _ It _ being their saviour arriving to give them a five percent chance of winning. When you consider that before him, they had, like, one percent, or a zero with a lot of zeros after it, raising the possibilities so much is admirable. 

But anyways, it goes like this:

“I have the answer to winning this: we should flee!” someone says, shaking down to their boots. And she says  _ someone _ instead of their name, because you have to guess who this is. Some clues: wears glasses, has sharp eyes, and is the only one who would suggest this while shaking like a leaf.

Yes, it’s Megane.

“Again?” Endou whines back. It’s one of his most charming traits. The always wanting to play a match no matter how outclassed he is, she means; not the whining. Although that’s kind of cute, too.

“Again!” Megane stomps on the floor, and looks at Hitomiko. Probably because she was the one who suggested this the last time. Her face doesn’t even twitch at the attention, and Megane falters. Because he is a liar, that makes his momentum stronger. “C’mon, Endou! Don’t tell me you believe we can beat them!”

Endou doesn’t even hesitate. “Of course we can! You never know until we play! And besides - ” He pats Gouenji’s back. “ - we have him back! With him, we can win!”

“I know! How can I not know?! Have you seen them?!” He frantically gestures at the team — Chaos? She thinks it’s Chaos — at Chaos. And Nae would focus on the players, but she’s kind of looking at the uniforms. Finally, someone from Aliea has taste.  _ Finally _ , someone wears normal t-shirts. And they suit the team. Sweet.

“I don’t know,” Nae says, dreamily. Someone from Aliea who wears t-shirts can’t be all that bad. And Nagumo, from what she remembers, is funny. “They seem pretty nice!”

Megane’s next noise is wordless, ineffable. It comes from the deep of his throat, but someone, it’s one of the most high-pitched sounds Nae has ever heard. The most pitiful, too. And that, combined with his eyes, so wide that the pupil is dwarfed by their white, makes her feel like she’s just kicked a puppy. A pretty pathetic puppy, but a puppy still.

“Are you pulling a prank on me? Is that it? Is this a really elaborate prank? A really inopportune prank?”

And then, a big presence appears. Usually, when someone walks into a crowded field, no one notices, but with this person, it’s as if the sky itself has parted, announcing their arrival. Raimon parts, too, like the sea before Moses, and through the space now left in the group, Nae can see this: silky blond hair, piercing red eyes, a cocky, but magnanimous, smile.

“Do you need any help?” Afuro Terumi says. It’s a question, but somehow it sounds like a command.

“Yes!” Megane says, instantly. He looks faint.

“Terumi!” Endou says.

“Terumi-san!” Aki pipes in at the same time, her mouth forming a small o. Oh, yeah, Someoka (ignore that pang in her chest) told her they played against Zeus in the finals of the Football Frontier. And that Zeus took drugs. She’s sure those were fun times for everyone involved.

The rest of the original Raimon is similarly surprised, while the new Raimon stand in the side of the reunion awkwardly. Only her, Shirou and Touko heard the story of the Football Frontier, she thinks, so this is probably very confusing for the rest. Well, Tachimukai may also know it, because he’s a big Endou fanboy and probably watched the match on TV.

Nae resolves herself not to tell them. It’s nice, to stand superior in innocent knowledge for once.

“Are you offering to help?” Kidou says to Afuro. Again, he’s the only one with common sense on this team.

Terumi tilts his head to the side, considering, and his hair shifts with it. None of it gets in front of his face, which, as Nae knows from doing that exact gesture thousands of times, is almost impossible. Maybe he  _ is _ a god. 

“Yes,” he finally says, and on his lips blooms a small smile. Nae would say it’s self-depreciating, except that gods don’t do that. “I find that I owe you a favour for pulling me and my team out of  _ his  _ influence. I intend to make us both equals with this.”

“Oh.” Endou folds his arms behind his head. “You know you don’t need to do that, right? I had fun playing football with you and that’s what mat—” Natsumi kicks the back of Endou’s knee, making him tumble to the floor. 

While he looks, betrayed, up at her, but she ignores him — just looks at Afuro and returns his smile with a tight-lipped one. “We’d appreciate your help, Afuro-san,” she says, just as… reticent? Low-key hateful? Seems like Natsumi holds grudges, there. Not that she blames her.

Afuro nods to her, acknowledging her feelings. She thinks. Even though Nae is a rich kid herself, she’s never been good at these layered interactions other rich kids do when things get heavy; she either tells what she feels directly or hides it forever, not say it indirectly and expect that the other person gets it.

Nae has never personally played against Afuro (one of their teams always lost in the round before the one in which they would meet) but she knows the boy’s power. Not just from Someoka’s retelling — although that was illustrative, too — but because her second year’s Football Frontier finals was a classic Zeus vs Inakuni Raimon, and Zeus won. As Norika always says, country-bumpkins aren’t so easy to defeat, so. There. More chances of winning.

Also, the only one from the team who harbours resentment for him is Natsumi. Maybe Haruna, because she looks like the type to hide everything behind bright smiles and she’s smiling right now, but Nae doesn’t know her enough to tell. That’s good, even if forgiving fast is kind of a flaw in most situations.

Anyways. The match starts.

“Be careful,” Hitomiko says, before sending them off. Even though there’s not a hint of worry in her face or in her voice, the fact that she has uttered those words is enough to know that she is. Worried, that is. And that’s the cutest!

And with that in mind, they step into the field.

Haha. When she says  _ they _ , Nae means they-they, as in, not including her. Because she’s on the bench for the entire first half, along with Rika and Tachimukai.

Usually, with this company, Nae would have spent all thirty minutes talking with them about whatever, but right now, with this match — it doesn’t feel right, is all. It’s not that she’s not interested in the match, but she’s already seen Chaos playing together, more or less, and so the match isn’t all that… calling to her. 

Still, there’s something that compels her to watch. Maybe it’s how, in spite of arguing during the entire match, Suzuno and Nagumo score eight goals against Endou. Maybe it’s how, even if there are clear cooperation problems here, the defenders don’t allow Gouenji to pass through.

Or maybe it’s the heavy atmosphere, the way even the air has weight, clogs her lungs and doesn’t allow her to breathe freely. They’re playing in the Raimon field, and the school feels bare and abandoned, despite having been clearly populated hours earlier. If this is the atmosphere Prominence and Diamond Dust had to stand during their long, long, long match, then -

Nae kind of pities them. But she pities herself, her team, more, because they’re the ones who have to live with it now.

The whistle blows after a seeming eternity. For one moment, she thinks the match has already ended, but - oh, no, it’s just the half time. And so Nae plops her ass back down on the bench and smiles when the rest of the team comes, telling them not to give up, that they can still win this, that as long as the final whistle doesn’t sound, there’s still a chance -

They don’t look too convinced, but Nae knows from experience that positive words help. If not, Endou wouldn’t be half as good a captain as he is.

She slides to the left in time for Shirou to sit down. The tips of his hairs wilt as he does, his eyes turn greyer and greyer. With his elbows propped on his knees, he’s not breathing, but gulping air. His fists are clenched.

She nudges his arm with a water bottle. “You okay?”

“...I’m fine,” he answers, and really, does he think he’s going to convince anyone with that small tone of voice? He’s clearly not okay! 

“Yeah, yeah.” Nae sighs. If he doesn’t want to talk about it… “Don’t beat yourself too much over it, you hear me? You may not have scored, but you had a few close attempts.”

Shirou hums non comitally, and Nae sighs again. Fubukis and their thick head.

Giving it up (for now), Nae gets up and starts to stretch. It’s probable that she doesn’t get to play today, but she gets nervous seeing everybody move without her being able to. She needs to do something - would run a little marathon if they weren’t currently in the middle of a match.

“Ichinose, to the bench. Shiratoya, you’re on next,” Hitomiko says, because she lives to contradict her. Smiling a little, Nae salutes, and runs with the rest of her team to the center of the field. In the background, there’s Rika’s indignated squawk at being the only forward currently not playing.

But enough of outside stimuli: she has to concentrate.

And so, Nae examines the other team. She’d already examined them earlier, of course, and the thing about them is this: they’re not one team, they’re two teams stuck together. And to win, they have to fracture them. Starting by their co-captains.

“Chaos.  _ Chaos _ . What a burningly stupid name! This team should be called Heat!”

“Heat?” The disgust is palpable. “Are you out of your mind? Chaos is a perfectly fine name, but if you want to go for names so good they’ll leave you out cold, we should name the team Cool.”

“That’s the most horrible thing I’ve heard in my entire life.”

...Not that they need any help with that. Apparently, someone sparked a discussion during the break, and it’s carried over the second half. Not that she’s going to complain — they score three goals thanks to them being more concentrated on their words than on their feet. 

Really, Nagumo and Suzuno are plenty strong, but they should have waited a little before challenging Raimon. If they had solved their infighting… they would have been near indestructible.

Then again, Raimon would have been stronger too. Hmm…

Anyways, because Nae is socially smart (or at least, she likes to think that), during the kick-off after Raimon’s third goal, when their discussion has dwindled into muttered complaints, she steps up to them and smiles.

“Hey,” she begins, innocently, “did you know there’s a rumour about you two?”

Suzuno and Nagumo share glances, way more concentrated than two guys who spend all the day fighting should. Warily, Nagumo steps forward and asks, “A rumour?” 

Nae nods one, two, three times, smile never leaving her face. “Yeah, yeah, yeah! A rumour!”

“And what is it?” Suzuno asks, coolly. He’s even crossing his arms and all. 

Ohohohoho. She can’t believe they’ve bitten! Woah, their curiosity is a dangerous, dangerous thing. 

“Well…” She pauses, just to watch them lean forward slightly. Her smile widens. “I’ve heard that people think your jokes are worse than Su - Gazelle’s, Burn.”

“WHAT?!” 

“Ha. I knew it.” Suzuno shakes his head in a gesture eerily reminiscent of Hitomiko. Hm. Do they know each other? ...Nah, that would be a coincidence too big. “There was no need of rumours confirming the obvious. My puns are just… too cool.”

“What do you mean - the  _ obvious _ ?! What’s obvious is how I’m going to reduce you to ashes!”

“Stop doing that. Haven’t we established your puns are unfunny? It’s giving me chills with how disgusting it is.”

Nagumo emits a wordless scream. His eyes are so wild that it’s a wonder he hasn’t thrown himself to Suzuno and started to beat him to the ground. Maybe he doesn’t want to get expelled from the match. Still, it’s surprising how much self-restraint he’s showing — the urge must be  _ burning _ him. Haha.

But wow, Nae thought the fake rumour would irk them, but she went and stomped on a whole lot of nerves. Not that she cares — they’ve managed to drag the score closer to Chaos’s thanks to the major infighting, so. Nice!

They lack  _ so _ much discipline, though. Like, who starts tripping a teammate in the middle of a match? She gets that they don’t like each other (even if that’s probably pretend) but really? Really? They’re playing a match against Raimon, here! But they’re trying to score against their own goalkeeper because, in their synchronised words, “Raimon’s is useless!”

Of course, she doesn’t say anything out loud, no matter how much the words burn on her tongue. They’re doing all the work for them, even if they scored one goal to Endou in accident.

By the second half of the second half, the score is 9-9. A tie.

(In the background, Gran facepalms. Really… They had it. They almost had it, and they had to ruin it because of their cheesy puns.)

Sadly, all good things must come to an end, and this is no exception. When the commentator announces that Raimon has managed to tie, Nagumo and Suzuno look at each other, grudgingly evaluating. 

“Hm,” Nagumo begins. His grimace says it all: uttering his next works is like pulling teeth. “We have to stop this, or else they’ll burn us to ashes!”

Suzuno purses his lips together, but refrains on commenting on that pun. Ah, she wishes he would. Then he wouldn’t say what she’s sure he’s about to say and ruin all her efforts in creating a fake rumour!

But - sigh - he doesn’t and so he says, “Yes. No matter how much it chills me to admit it - “ Nagumo emits a strangled noise. “ - we must strike a truce.”

“Yeah…” Nagumo already looks ready to break it before starting, but again, demonstrating too much self-control, he sticks his hand out. “Truce?”

Suzuno takes the hand. “Truce.”

“Uh-oh,” Nae says.

“Uh-oh,” the rest of the team say.

“Uh-oh,” Endou says, a bit belatedly. “Wait, no! This is great! It’s going to make the match way more fun!” As he says it, he’s smiling like the madman he is. Really, there are moments when you have to have fun, but having a match against Chaos isn’t one of them.

Kabeyama is staring at Endou in unspeakable horror. Glad to see someone here agrees with her.

When combined, Nagumo and Suzuno are unstoppable. They breeze through all the forwards and midfielders as if they’re nothing more than hot air, and the struggles of the defenders don’t mean anything to them.

So, of course, when Endou runs out of the goal to help steal the ball, it doesn’t work either, even if it gives a heart-attack to everyone watching. Really, it’s been a long time since she’s felt the air get stuck in her lungs like this while watching a football match. Even Hitomiko has made an audible gasp of surprise. Endou should get an award — he’s achieved the impossible.

“Are you stupid?” Nagumo says to him, as he dribbles him without effort. “You’re a goalie — you don’t know how to defend better than the defenders.”

“...You can’t know that if you don’t try!” Oh. This is the first time that sentence has sounded unadvisable, she thinks. Really, you shouldn’t use it to enable reckless things!  _ You never know if you can survive throwing yourself of a plane unless you try! _ Honestly, Endou, get yourself some limitations!

Endou attacks again, trying to steal the ball from Suzuno this time, but it’s clear he will never manage it. His posture is all wrong! He may be quick on his feet for a goalkeeper, but he is still a novice on this running thins and now their goal is empty and Chaos is approaching and if they score another goal they’ll probably win -

Nae runs like a girl possessed. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see the rest doing it, too.

Nagumo finishes dribbling Endou for the third time, but Kabeyama is already there to stop him. His face is set on a determined frown, not betraying the fear he surely must be feeling inside.

“THE WALL!” he screams, just as the floor starts to shake and a big colossus of earth and rock comes out of nothing, towering over Nagumo. 

The boy trips, but just before doing so, he passes the ball — ugh — to Suzuno, who doesn’t have balance problems. Domon tries to tackle him, but Suzuno dribbles easily, almost as if he hasn’t seen him. Kogure is there to meet him, though, but before he can do a good old Whirlwind Force, Suzuno passes the ball to Nagumo, who has already gotten up and is running towards the empty goal.

Still empty. Really, what is Endou doing? Run back!

Thankfully, your girl Nae arrives in that moment, thanks to her amazing speed, honed through years of running. She has the advantage thanks to being a fast forward — a surprise attack coming from his back. Hehe. He’ll never expect it!

And so, Nae widens her stride and slide tackles him. He sucks in a sharp breath when her foot touches the ball, but with too fast reflexes, he kicks it to the side before she can fully take it, to where — surprise, surprise! — Suzuno is. 

And where is he? Too close to the goal, that’s where he is! 

Touko is their last barrier before they have a free goal, and she knows it; it’s in her tense shoulders and her wide stance. She parts her lips, takes a short breath, obviously ready to call out her hissatsu.

And then Suzuno passes the ball to an already-standing-up Nagumo, who kicks it towards the  _ still damn empty _ goal. Nae would look around to look for Endou and glare at him, but right now her eyes are stuck on the ball, on the bullet-like ball that’s flying towards the goal with nobody to stop it. 

Her heart is being squeezed inside her chest. It’s going to enter. It’s going to enter. It’s going to enter, it’s going to enter, it’s going to enter it’s going to enter it’s going to enter—

A flash of white passes through the corner of her eye. Please,  _ please _ , let it be what she thinks it is…!

Just when the ball is about to cross the white line and drag the score to 10-9, a leg gets in the middle and, with a bit of effort, stops its course. She would like to say that the movement is controlled and graceful, confident, just to make the moment even cooler, but again, Nae isn’t a liar; Shirou’s eyes are blown wide, and the movement is a desperate lunge forward. Desperate: to reach the ball, to not let them score, to be useful to the team.

Still, no matter the feeling behind the movement, the thing is this - the ball rolls to the ground, out of bounds, while they stare at it for a long moment, speechless.

Then, the world erupts in chaos. 

“SHIROU…!”

“You’re the best!”

“What a save!”

“Oh my god. Guys, I think I need to go to the loo…”

“We didn’t score because of your shabby pass!”

“ _ My _ shabby pass? I think you mean  _ your  _ weak as fire shot. He stopped it without a hissatsu.”

“I’ll give you weak as fire, you dumburn—!”

Nae smiles in relief, all her body untensing all at once, and around her, everybody does the same. She wipes sweat off her forehead, and then wipes it some more. Phew! That had been really close!

Shirou himself is grimacing mildly, moving his left ankle with a wild look on his face. Something twists inside her chest, almost all relief gone in an instant, and she gets up and approaches him. 

“Is something the matter, Shirou?” she asks. He’s sitting on the fake grass, one hand holding his ankle while the other tightens on the post of the goal. Because she’s not dumb, she adds, “Does your ankle hurt?”

Shirou opens his mouth, then closes it. The gears are practically visible as they turn on his head, steam flowing away from his ears.

“Yes,” he finally says, and Nae wants wipe off the frustration in his face as soon as it appears. She doesn’t even try it, though; as a football player, she know how much a mid-match injury stings, especially when the match is as intense as this one. “I think I’ve sprained it.”

Nae grimaces. This is bad luck and the everything else is not. Really, she’s seen lots of people stop a harder shot than that with little to no injury. She’s even seen the Shirou of her world do it! Not that a sprained ankle is the end of the world, but it will leave him out of commission for this match. Maybe the next one, too, depending on when it happens.

She extends her hands, for lack of a better thing to do. “I’ll help you up.”

“Thank you,” he says, taking her hand to get up. She slings his arm around her shoulder, and helps him limp back to the bench.

Something moves in the background. Nae squints, trying to focus on that instead that on the team’s wheezing relief. After a second, the picture becomes clear. It’s Hitomiko, gesturing for a time-out.

This - doesn’t spell good news for Endou. And from the way his shoulders slump as he makes his way towards her, he knows it.

He’d really done it with this blunder, though — running ahead like that?: a real selfish move. Nae isn’t a fan of punishments, but he needs to learn his lesson someway, and as Chaos hasn’t scored, he hasn’t really learnt it from the situation itself.

Or maybe he does. Everything from the set of his shoulders to the tilt of his chin speaks about guilt. She trusts Endou to feel guilty about the right things, but she also kind of not. She’ll refrain about commenting, though; this is between a coach and a captain.

And this particular coach looks furious. As always, her feelings aren’t on her face — well, a little bit of them are, because she isn’t  _ expressionless _ , but still —, but on her, how would she describe it?, her aura?, the atmosphere around her?, the vibes she gives off?

Well, it doesn’t really matter. The thing is that she’s furious, and that, therefore, Endou isn’t in a good situation.

“Endou.” Hitomiko’s voice is icy cold. It even gives Nae chills, and it’s not directed at her. RIP for Endou, she guesses. It was nice knowing him and his cheerful smile and his passion for football.

“Yes, Coach?” he says, cringing but still daring to meet her eyes. Poor Endou, having to endure this conversation. Poor, poor Endou.

“You will not be a goalkeeper anymore, not until I tell you to,” she says firmly, resolutely. “You have proved today that you are not worthy of the position.”

Endou’s eyes widen, but he doesn’t say anything, just sneaks a guilty glance towards Shirou, still leaning on her. The rest of the team, however, does. Or at least Kidou. “But Coach—”

“Don’t argue with me, Kidou. You know what prompted this decision; he almost lost us the match with his stupid decision.” Wow, Endou made a real mistake, but there’s no need to be so venomous. Chill, Hitomiko, chill. Nae won’t ever say that aloud, but chill.

_ But he’s also won us a lot of them! _ is clearly on lips, but he doesn’t say it. Kidou understands as well as anyone here that no matter how much good you bring to a team, if you fail, bye bye. Football is a cruel sport — any in which someone has to lose is. That doesn’t mean it’s not fun, though!

Discussion settled, Nae helps Shirou limp towards the bench, makes him sit there. Immediately, the managers are on him: Aki taking his shoes and socks off, Haruna putting ice on his ankle, and Natsumi reprimanding him for being careless.

After that’s done, the rest of the team mob him with hair ruffles and loud congratulations and some quiet apologies. Shirou stands it all admirably — she thought this Shirou was leaning more towards the introvert side, but apparently he’s not that fundamentally different from her version. Or maybe he just has the best poker face ever.

After everyone has stopped being so clingy, there’s a small smile on his face, so. He’s probably a quiet extrovert, then. Or whatever. She turns around and stalks towards the field, where she’s going to be one of the two forwards. It’s not her place, to try to analyse him.

Her fellow forward, Gouenji, does the same as her. Probably trying to mentalise himself before the match resumes? At least, that’s what she’s doing. Or maybe he’s trying to familiarise himself with the field after so much time not playing. Perhaps? She doesn’t know how this refamiliarising thing works, having never parted with the ball herself.

Honestly, the atmosphere between them is a bit… awkward. She’s never spoken with him, neither in her world nor in this, despite having a lot of friends in common. And frankly, Gouenji is a bit intimidating. His resting face is too aggressive, his gaze too piercing, for her to be comfortable.

Nae has to try, though. She has to, because if she’s made the effort to get closer to most of the team, she has to make the effort here too. She doesn’t want to accidentally alienate him, even if it would be easier.

“So,” she begins. There are two minutes until the match resumes, and she’s going to make use of them, “how come you returned to the team?”

Hm. On retrospect, that's a heavy question to be the start of their first ever conversation, but. What’s said is said. And maybe it won’t be that heavy! Depends on the answer, really.

Gouenji sideeyes her. She’s grateful he doesn’t look directly at her; he seems to have realized that his full gaze unsettles her, and is considerate enough to prevent it. Nice guy, Gouenji is.

“...I couldn’t stand it anymore, not playing with Raimon,” he answers softly, after a brief pause. Nae blinks. Wow, that’s a bit too personal to reveal on their first ever conversation. Maybe the guy is also interested in knowing her. Or maybe he wants someone to talk to. Or  _ maybe _ she should start overanalysing everything. Chill, Nae. “After Coach assured me that there wouldn’t be consequences, I didn’t have any motive not to rejoin.”

Consequences? Nae isn’t going to ask, because  _ that _ certainly is too personal, but - consequences? He’s fourteen! What consequences are there for playing football?

...On the other hand, right now she’s saving Japan against some misguided wannabe aliens with football. She’s landed on the most annoying world to play, it seems. Really, this is just a sport. Why can’t these things be saddled to the basketball club? At least they’re jerks, and they deserve it.

“Oh,” Nae says, before the silence stretches so much that it’s awkward. “Are you having fun?” 

She immediately bites her tongue, because they’re saving the world, it’s not supposed to be fun! Really, Nae, what’s happening to you? You used to have better questions! This is because you haven’t been sleeping as much, isn’t it? Honestly!

The way Gouenji looks at her makes it clear that he’s thinking more or less along the same lines as she is. She refuses to blush. If she’s asked a stupid question, she’ll look stupid, but certainly  _ not _ embarrassed. As her mother used to say,  _ there’s no place for embarrassment in the Shiratoya family _ !

“I... think you already know the answer to that.”

Yes, yes she does, but he doesn’t need to be so passive-agressive! What problem did he have with answering “I’m not having fun right now but when I’m in not-world-risking matches I do!” Really, this guy is impossible.

Maybe she’s being a little — just a little! — unfair with him, but she doesn’t care, not right now, not when the match is going to restart any moment now and she’s so nervous that her heart is going to jump off her chest.

The rest of Raimon settles into their positions; Tachimukai as the new goalkeeper, Domon, Kabeyama, Tsunami and Kogure as defenders, Terumi, Kidou, Ichinose and Touko as midfielders and Gouenji and her as forwards. All in all, a pretty traditional formation, except in that Tachimukai is debuting as Raimon’s goalkeeper and is shaking like a leaf.

She cranes her head to send him an encouraging look, but she’s too far away to do anything else. Let’s hope the defenders know how to deal with him; Tsunami in particular seems especially close, so maybe he’ll know what to do.

Anyways… Nae looks forward, to Nagumo’s fiery eyes and Suzuno’s cold smirk, and flashes them a smile with a bit too many teeth. Maybe there’s doubt, lying deep in her belly, but the smile helps to convince herself: they are going to win, they are going to win, they are going to win.

Let the match begin.

Disappointingly, nothing much happens after that. 

True, there wasn’t much time left, but there was enough to score a goal or two! Nobody scored, though, so maybe there wasn’t. What is time, anyways?

The match ends in a tie. It’s better than a loss, yeah, but everything is, and a tie is so  _ boring _ . A loss is bitter, yeah, but it’s better to feel something than to look at the score and not. Or maybe that’s just her. 

Suzuno and Nagumo have started to argue again, so that’s fun. They’re calling each other cheesy insults, like “icediot” or “dumburn” and the second-hand embarrassment everyone feels is palpable. Really, her chest hurts, just hearing the lame puns roll out of their mouth. They should take classes, because wow, they seriously need them.

Thankfully, Tatsuya in his weird alien get-up comes to take them away from her poor ears. Even greater: Tatsuya drags them away by the ears, which is one of the funniest sights ever. Imagine two fierce rivals, against whom you’ve just fought a battle to the death (this is not what happened, but  _ imagine _ ), being reduced to two whiny kids with red ears. It’s perfect.

Before vanishing, as Aliea is prone to do, Tatsuya gives a subtle nod to Hitomiko. Well, it’s not so subtle, because if Nae notices it at least has to be a normal kind of nod, but. She’s pretty sure Tatsuya intended it to be. Subtle, that is. 

There’s not any harm in asking, she guesses. “Coach Hitomiko,” she begins, turning to look at her. She’s all sweaty and desperately wants to have a bath, so let’s hope this doesn’t drag on too much. “Do you know - him?”

And Hitomiko looks at her,  _ really _ looks at her, greyish eyes piercing into Nae’s own. It’s a long second, an eternal stare-off, but finally, for once, Hitomiko breaks, and her eyes go from Nae’s eyes to her nose. To an inexperienced person it would look like she’s still looking at her eyes, but Nae is a rich kid and knows this kinds of tactics.

“No. I don’t know him,” she lies. 

And Nae, as she said before, is stinky, so she doesn’t press. It’s not her business and she doesn’t need to know, anyways.

So now, she’s in the bathroom’s cue. One of the last, in fact, along with Terumi. It’s a bit sad, being almost alone in a queue, but well, at least she’s almost done. Only Kabeyama, who is inside, and Terumi for her turn! Woohoo!

And now that she’s alone with the… midfielder? Forward? — with the football player, she can take the opportunity to ask the question that’s been predating her mind since she first saw him.

“What kind of shampoo do you use?”

Terumii turns his head to look at her, his silky, silky hair falling around his shoulders like a halo. Nae wants to touch it. Nae desperately wants to touch it.

“Why do you ask?”

Is. Is that a real question that has just come out of Mister Perfect Hair’s mouth? Has she heard it well? Is this real? How is any of this real? Is it even possible to be so unconscious of yourself and your appearance?

Nae opens her mouth, and then closes it with a click. Nope. She doesn’t want to have this conversation.

Terumi chuckles, a hand covering his mouth elegantly. “Forgive me. I was just… joking around.” Oh, so he’s one of those kinds of people. The funny haha ones. “I use Godreal.”

Nae also uses Godreal, but her hair isn’t even half as silky as his. She makes it known.

“Oh,” Terumi says, tilting his head minutely. His hair flows like a cascade. How much do you think he’ll charge for cutting a bit for her to touch? Too much? Yeah, she also thinks so. That hair is quality. “That may be because of the softener.”

“Hm,” Nae says. She doesn’t remember ever using a softener, mainly because she’s too lazy to take a shower involving more than four steps, but if  _ these _ are the results… She’ll think about it. “Same brand?”

Terumi nods. “Same brand.”

And then Kabeyama comes out of the bathroom and Terumi goes in, after nodding goodbye in her direction. She nods back, but it doesn’t look half as cool as his.

“So,” Touko begins the next morning, blinking up at Hitomiko, “are we going to play against Genesis or what?”

Hitomiko observes her, and then the rest of the team, one by one. Her face doesn’t betray any emotions, but clearly her conclusion must not be favorable, because she says, “No, not yet. You’re still not ready.”

She doesn’t look at Endou when she says it, but really, everybody knows who the words are meant for. Even Endou, who is so oblivious he doesn’t notice a practically direct confession, if Aki and Natsumi are to be believed. Last Girls’ Night was full of juicy, juicy gossip.

Nobody protests this statement, even though it clearly burns on some (Kogure, Rika, Shirou) more than others. Everybody knows it’s true — the only reason they were able to tie against Chaos was because it was a hastily made team. Had they had more time to familiarise themselves to each other - well, maybe things would’ve turned out differently.

Although, Nae muses, then Raimon would’ve had more time to train. She shouldn’t underestimate this team’s strength after one or two days of training. Maybe in one or two days, they’ll be more than ready to face Genesis. They’ll have to see.

“My team would like to have a rematch against you,” Terumi interjects. All eyes turn to him. “We have gotten way stronger since you last fought against us.”

Half of the current Raimon hasn’t even seen the full Zeus team, let alone played against them, but if it works as a symbolic match for Terumi, she’s not going to complain. Besides, the Zeus uniforms are the prettiest ever. If she asks, will they let her try one? If they don’t, she’ll be forced to steal, and let it be said that she’s not a subtle robber.

Hitomiko considers Terumi’s offer for a second, staring at him with those deep, intimidating eyes. Finally, her lips curl into a smile, satisfied smile.

“We accept your offer, Terumi-kun,” she says, and that’s how they find themselves inside a literal coliseum. Like, the one who demanded it to be built was a little… over the top, to say the least. Nae’d like to meet him — they’re sure to be soulmates.

The place feels a little empty without public, but it’s still… grandiose. The walls go up and up and up; not more ups, because it’s not a skyscraper, but it’s still many ups for a normal building. Nae feels like an old Roman warrior, just by being in here. 

And by wearing the uniform. Zeus uniform! She just had to ask and — voilà! — they let her! Zeus is  _ so _ nice. She can’t believe they got drugged and almost sent Raimon to the original. ...Although Aliea is also trying to do that, despite Nae knowing for a fact that they’re the nicest people ever. Is this what people call character development?

Anyways, the uniform. She twirls and the uniform swishes. She runs and the uniform swishes. She jumps and the uniform  _ swishes _ !

This is the greatest thing ever. Seriously. Even better than iDOLM@STER, and nothing’s better than iDOLM@STER.

“Can’t I play with this uniform?” Nae asks Hitomiko when the latter demands her to get changed so they can start playing. “Pretty please with a cherry on top?”

Hitomiko shakes her head, and Nae’s face falls. “That would be too confusing for everyone involved. Go change.”

“But - but - ” Nae’s not going to give up that easily. She would  _ kill _ for this uniform. Okay, maybe not kill, but something close to it. So think, Nae. Think! “But - “ A lightbulb lights up. “What if I play with Zeus?” Terumi is playing with Raimon, anyways, so there’s a hole in the team.

“Is this a betrayal I’m hearing?” Rika interjects. Thankfully, it’s a joke — she doesn't think Rika would take well to actual traitors. She’s the kind of person who’s all of nothing with her trust.

Nae shrugs (and the uniform  _ swishes _ !). “Yeah.”  _ Everything _ (mostly) for the uniform.

And because life is great, Hitomiko is examining her as if she’s considering her improvised suggestion. If  _ she _ were the coach, Nae would never had allowed it unless the player in question had at least said two pretty pleases. It seems Hitomiko’s standards are lower.

“Alright,” she says, and Nae starts to hop around like a cute bunny. 

“Yay! Yay! Yay!”

“You traitor,” Rika says, extending her hand for a high-five. Nae gladly reciprocates.

“Yay! Yay! Yay!”

The match starts not soon after that. 

Usually, Nae would be a tiny little bit nervous, playing with people she’s never spoken to in either dimension, especially when half of them are so big and bulky than three Naes could get one con top of another, press together at the sides, and they would still be bigger.

However, there’s something about them that just - doesn’t. Maybe it’s that they smiled at her when she walked into their midst, or maybe it’s that they share the same uniform Yeah, it’s probably the uniform. There’s something about it that makes you feel on top of the world. (It’s the swishing.)

The feeling is so consuming that she’s gotten sunglasses to go along with it. She can see Hitomiko frowning from her place in the field (sunglasses make it more difficult to see, especially when they’re not necessary), but hah! Right now you’re not her coach, Hitomiko! You can’t tell her what to do!

Besides, these glasses were a joke gift from her father in her last birthday. In Hokkaido, you never need sunglasses.

In Raimon, the formation is different. Like, obviously the goal is different, because Endou is forbidden from being a goalie, but he’s playing as a midfielder! Or maybe a libero. They must have argued this while she familiarised herself with Zeus, because this is the first news she has about this change.

Obviously, Shirou isn’t playing, although Nae wouldn’t put it past Hitomiko to get him to play later. She’s always been a bit of a slave driver, even if she’s been getting better about treating them as people by leaps and bounds.

Also, Terumi is playing in her place. It’s a bit weird, to see him along with Gouenji but neither of them speaking. Nae has made the effort to start speaking to the flame striker from time to time, so that things run smoothly, so… it’s off-putting to see her effort vanished. Even if it hasn’t really vanished, because she’s not Terumi, but still.  _ Still _ .

But hmmm… Terumi is new, and Gouenji is also more or less new. And they were old rivals. Hmmm… There’s probably a weak point in there. She’ll exploit it during the match, if it really exists. On the one hand, she hopes it does, because right now she’s Zeus (she’s wearing the uniform!, and it swishes!), but she also hope it doesn’t, because deep in her heart, Raimon has started to share a place with Hakuren.

Well, she guesses that if it really does exist, there’s an easy fix. Nae’ll just have to be a forward forever!

Playing with Zeus is  _ so _ fun!

It’s been a long time since she’s been on a team whose hissatsus overpowered the other team’s. Aliea hasn’t really done her any favours in determining the normal difference of power a rival should have, but now she kind of wants to play in their side. If almost always winning hissatsu duels is so satisfying, then it’s no wonder that they’re on a power high. She would be, too.

Maybe all of Raimon’s rivals receive a divine power-up before they’re going to play. Maybe that’s why Raimon is always weaker. And then God takes it away from them when Raimon has been suitably massacred, and that’s how they always manage to get back in the game and win.

Nae has cracked the code!

Or maybe not, because, in her opinion, God doesn’t exist. Not that she’ll ever mention that little funny opinion to Zeus. She doesn’t want to lose her head.

“Shiratoya-chan! Concentrate!” Hephaestus says, and passes her the ball. 

Out of reflex, she starts to run, but it’s not until she’s in front of Kidou that she realises she’s in the middle of a match and that she has the ball. And that she has to dribble, before Kidou manages to get the ball!

Aah, this is too much stress for her! Life shouldn’t be so sudden!

Kidou’s eyes are visible from this close, and they flicker to her left before focusing on her feet again. That… probably isn’t a faint, so she dribbles from her right side and - yay! She gets past Kidou! She’ll warn him about that little weak point later, after she’s crushed him in the match.

Oh, but before - she passes the ball before Kabeyama reaches her and does the most awesome defense hissatsu ever, and he purses his lips at her, almost in a pout. She grins back, and runs past, ready to receive the ball if the situation calls for it.

Nae wasn’t wrong: Shirou comes out a little in the second half.

He plays as a forward, which means it’s not really Shirou™, but whatever weird, strangely familiar thing is possessing him. Or maybe it’s not a possession, she shouldn’t be so close-minded. Anyways: it’s Weird Shirou, which means more risk of aggression — verbal aggression, but still. Nae isn’t looking forward to it.

Despite his injury, it’s almost impossible to get the ball from him, unless you go with two supports and a bit of luck. Nae still does, because she’s been playing against Atsu - ...against  _ Shirou _ ... since she started to play football, and she knows his strategies forwards and backwards.

(He always tries to dribble to the left. Sssshh! Don’t tell him!)

Once the match ends, Hitomiko calls Nae back to Raimon, and she stares dejectedly at her uniform. She’s going to have to return it. She’s going to have to return it and she doesn’t want to but if she takes it with her it would be theft and— 

...Hm.

What was so wrong with theft again?

A hand touches her shoulder. She glances back and smiles at Poseidon, who blinks and nods. The boy is the type that doesn’t smile often, but that’s okay, she knows she’s nice and charming, she doesn’t need a smile to get reassurance of it.

“You can keep the uniform,” he says, slowly but firmly, as if to make sure she doesn’t misunderstand. 

Nae lightens up like a Christmas tree on Christmas day. “Really?” she squeaks, starting to hop in place. “Really? Really really really?” A nod. Nae lunges in for a hug, and she ends up hanging on Poseidon’s neck, spinning around it. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Poseidon’s big hand lays on her back, forcing to make her stop, but softly. Everything he does is soft, probably because he’s trying to overcompensate for his big size. “You are welcome.”

Nae jumps off his neck, and, smiling sheepishly, returns to the Raimon side. Hitomiko had already cleared her throat three sharp times — if Nae doesn’t return soon, only a swift but painful death will await her. And so, she hurries, elated at how the uniform swishes as she runs. Zeus is  _ so _ nice — if she ever dimension travels again, she’ll join them.

“You took your time,” Hitomiko snaps, like the rude person she is. She’s probably miffed that they have tied against Zeus. Nae smiles, unrepentant.

“I’m sorry, Coach!” she says, and spins around to show the beauty of her uniform. Her sunglasses almost slide off her nose. “They were just giving me a parting gift!”

“You look very pretty with it, Shiratoya-chan!” Haruna says, flashing her a thumbs up. Nae flashes a thumbs up right back.

The rest of the team comes up with compliments until Nae has a very, very, very, very slight blush in her cheeks. At that point, Kogure pipes up and starts teasing her for being embarrassed, and Nae retaliates by mocking his voice. They end up sticking their tongues at each other, but then - Hitomiko clears her throat.

For the fourth time.

Kogure and Nae immediately turn around and straighten like the good little soldiers they are, Nae even doing the military salute. Hitomiko narrows her eyes at her, dangerous, but, in the end, she just sighs and doesn’t give her a lecture on proper behaviour. Yay! Nae gets scout free! This is turning out to be the best of her life!

She holds the salute until Hitomiko starts speaking. “Go on. Tell the team about what you’ve noticed.”

As the rest of the team looks at her with confusion, Nae blinks. How can someone be so observant? Has she been watching her for the entire match? Can you even know with that much certainty what other person has noticed, just by seeing?

Apparently yes, or else Hitomiko wouldn’t know. Maybe this was her plan from the beginning. Maybe that was why she let her go and play with Zeus. If so, Nae’s not doubting her coaching skills ever again. Pinky promise.

“We -  _ ell _ ,” she said, turning to the team, when the silence extends a second too long. “Turns out it’s pretty easy to see what you fail at when you’re in the opposite team. Who knew, haha!” Hitomiko did, but she wasn’t going to mention it. 

“Oh,” Kidou says, looking uncomfortable for some reason. Is he embarrassed of being observed? Uncomfortable? Does he feel like he’s the only one who can observe in this team. Well, her heart goes out to him, really, but tough luck. “That’s… interesting. What did you notice?”

And with that, she rattles off all the mistakes she’d seen; one per player, more or less, except for Endou, who has loads. Unperks of being a first-time libero.

He tells Kidou about his eyes being more visible than he thinks they are; Gouenji about how he should connect more with the team, and the same to Terumi; Tsunami about how he sometimes gets too reckless, and Touko about how she’s a bit too little; Shirou about how he’s too predictable, Kogure about how he should be more, because his teammates can’t manage to get into his rhythm…

If she recounted what she told Endou, they would be here all day. He doesn’t have  _ that _ many failings, but she felt so bad about pointing more than three that she compensated with one good thing per two bad ones, and yeah. The list got pretty long. 

And then, the unexpected happened—

“I wasn’t aware you could see that well. It has to be because of your glasses. Haha.”

—Kidou made a joke.

(Or well, at least she thinks it’s one, if the way he adjusted his glasses fake-smug was of any indication.)

(It’s not a very good one.)

Nae punches him in the shoulder instead of dwelling on the sheer intricacies that make that joke so eerily  _ awful _ . Of course, her punch is soft (she’s a footballer, not a boxer), way, way softer than that joke deserves, and he smirks in retaliation. Jerk.

“So,” Rika says, popping out her lips as she finishes applying the last of her lip gloss, “who are your crushes? C’mon, gals, fess up! Don’t leave me hanging!”

Touko sighs with the patience of someone who has been asked that question a million times. She’s the one who spends the most time with Rika, so she probably has. RIP, Touko. RIP. “No  _ one _ , Rika. Stop asking.”

Touko is sitting on the further corner of the tent — further for Rika, of course, who apparently triggers all of Touko’s alarms when she gets like this. It’s a very smart strategy, because Rika can’t move without disturbing Nae, who is painting her toenails black. Touko has saved herself from some pointy nudges.

Rika settles in wiggling her eyebrows suggestively, and Nae smothers a laugh. “Really?” Rika says, grinning. “Because I’ve seen the way you look at Endou—”

As always, when the topic of Endou comes out, there are ruffles feathers whose owners are expert in hiding. It’s only visible in the way Aki’s hand stops for a second in its combing of Haruna’s hair, in the way Natsumi’s hands clench and instantly relax on her pinkish pajama pants.

Touko, meanwhile, is as careless and direct as ever. “Endou? Pfffft! He’s fun and nice and everything, but I don’t think he’s capable of loving anyone like that.” More ruffled feathers. Way to go, Touko. “Except football, of course.”

Nae’s mind tries to conjure the image of Endou married to someone, to anyone, but she’s incapable of visualising it. Touko’s right: if Endou remains Endou, there’s no way he’ll ever notice someone is confessing to him, let alone accept. 

Everyone must be thinking something along the same lines, because Aki sighs, Haruna huffs a laugh, Natsumi buries her (red, red) face in her hands and Rika nods to Touko, acquiescing the point.

Nae giggles. Girl Nights are always fun like this, even if it means she has to sleep in a  _ tent _ . Really, the boys get to sleep on their comfy seats-turned-beds (and she does too, after much insistence, but only after that) while girls have to sleep outside, where it’s freezing and wet, with only sleeping bags and a measly tent for protection? Totally unfair.

And it’s also unfair that Nae and Touko are forced to sleep here every time they have a Girl Night. Like, she guesses that traditionally boys aren’t allowed in a Girl Night, but c’mon. It would be fun! Imagine how much innuendo would go over Endou’s head!

But every time she suggests this, Natsumi levels a glare at her, and that shuts her up. Natsumi is  _ scary _ . Awesome, but scary.

Still, Girl Nights are fun. It would be even more fun if Touko and Natsumi deigned themselves to submit to the power of makeup. Really, what does it matter if they have to wipe it off before going to bed? Putting makeup on is fun and taking silly pictures with it is fun, too! Like, she gets that Touko doesn’t like makeup but Natsumi does! She’s just too practical.

Sigh.

If they don’t join the fun, then Nae will have enough for the three of them! And so, she paints a smiley face on Rika’s big toe toenail and gossips about her past couples. It makes a bit of nostalgia set in, but she doesn’t let it take root, and instead laughs with her friends.

Coming to this time, to this place, may not have been the peachiest thing to happen in her life, but really, it’s also not the worst.

After two more days of resting in Tokyo, once Shirou’s injury is fully healed, they start their voyage towards their final confrontation against Aliea. Towards Mount Fuji.


	8. VIII: Towards Mount Fuji

It’s raining. 

Nae likes rain, really. The sound of it clattering against windows is one of the most relaxing things _ever_ , but - but right now, enjoying it is a little bit hard, what with the team’s atmosphere being what it is. 

Everyone’s trying to pretend they’re not nervous, but c’mon, they’re not fooling anyone. It’s less that two days before they reach Mount Fuji, before they reach Genesis and all that implies. 

There won’t be another try — it’s written in Hitomiko’s eyes, mouth, tense, tense shoulders. If they lose this, if they fail, then Japan is doomed. Maybe the world.

It’s a bit ridiculous, that the fate of so many people has fallen onto football, onto the shoulders of a team of barely teenagers (and Tsunami; and Nae, technically). Not even the Prime Minister is stopping this; he’s just - helping from the sidelines, and watching kids get hurt.

Okay, she shouldn’t be so bitter about it. The Prime Minister is doing what he can, and he’s sent his beloved daughter here, so he probably isn’t happy with the situation. But Nae, she’s used to football being fun, not a duty, not an instrument to save something. There’s always some wacky corruption going on in the background of any football tournament that dares to call itself tournament, but it’s not. It doesn’t. Kids aren’t taken out of their homes and forced to travel the country for those messes. They help, but they don’t solve it entirely on their own.

She stares out of the window, and tiny droplets crash and burn (metaphorically) against the glass. Things work different in here, she knows it, she’s felt it, she’s experienced it. Still, that doesn’t make it right.

Knocking her head against the window, she sighs. Well, at least, this won’t go on for much longer. Raimon has to win, Raimon _will_ win, and then they’ll get out of this mess and start enjoying, really enjoying, football again.

Nae can’t wait. 

A hand taps her shoulder delicately, and Nae doesn’t even have to move her head to know it’s Shirou. He has a kind of a special delicate touch — one of his many, many appeals that granted him the title of the Prince of Hakuren. 

She still tilts her head to lock her eyes with his, though. Speaking without facing the other is rude. 

“Um,” he says, smiling ruefully. His smiles are always like that. “Would you - like to accompany me to train?”

And though she’s painfully aware of the rain hitting the window, of the freezing cold that she will have to fight if she goes outside, Nae grins. “Of course, Shirou! I’d always like to train with you!” She’s a Hakuren girl. She can stand a little cold, even if she’s not really used to rain.

Shirou’s smile turns a little more relieved, a little more real, at that, but it’s still tainted by the tinge of sadness he carries everywhere. Nae would like nothing more than envelop him in a blanket burrito and protect him from the evils of the world but — she mentally sighs — they’ve already spoken about it. She can’t.

He offers her his hand, and she takes it, like the princess she is, to help her get up of her seat. His hands are trembling a little, but she pretends not to notice.

The bus is full of people, but not as full as it should be with the weather outside. Endou, of course, is training, because when is he not? They have to stop the caravan at least two times every day for him to train a little. Kidou, as usual, is with him, and so are Terumi and Tachimukai and Tsunami. 

As they exit the caravan, Nae crosses gazes with Gouenji. She blinks. He’s not training with Endou? They’ve been attached at the hip since the striker got here, so… She hopes there hasn’t been a fight. Although fighting with Endou is practically impossible unless you look for it — he’s that nice.

“Wait,” Gouenji says in that soft voice of his, getting up from his seat next to the door. “I want to train with you.”

Shirou and Nae look at each other, but just for a second. She nods to him, allowing him to take the lead, but frankly, she’d like Gouenji to come. It’s a big step, asking to train with people out of your comfort zone, and Nae doesn’t want to ruin it.

“Alright,” Shirou says, because apparently he doesn’t want to ruin it either. He drops his grip on her hand, and now it feels cold. Ow.

Gouenji nods at them, and they walk out of the caravan in search of a clearing to be able to practice shots or whatever it is they’re about to do. The cold slams against her like a trainwreck the moment they go out the door, but she doesn’t even twitch. Hakuren girl, remember?

They explore the area in companionable silence, although there’s a bit of tension in the air. Not because of Gouenji — he’s nice, no matter his quietness or his bitchy resting face —, but because of Shirou. Shirou, and his tight mouth, stiff shoulders and twitching fingers. Nae kind of wants to take his hand again to make it relax, but she has to let him come to her. It’s the only way.

Eventually, they find an empty clearing and — look and behold! — there’s a football field there. There are football fields in the weirdest locations, so Nae shouldn't be surprised anymore, but she always is. Did the same person build them all, anyways? Or were they just fanatics of football architecture the same way Endou is a fanatic of the sport itself?

She guesses it doesn’t matter. She’ll never have answers, anyways.

They start to train.

Shirou has recovered completely of his injury, like, it’s as if was never there. Of course, he didn’t spend much time down (not even a week, if her calculations don’t fail her) (they don’t), so of course it shouldn’t affect his overall performance. Nae kind of thought they were training on the rainiest day of the year to fix that, but she guesses that can’t be it.

No matter what the training is for, it’s fun. The three of them are strikers, so they kick the ball around a little to get a feel for it, and then… they start with the hissatsus. They throw around powerful shoots without a care in the world, and soon, it turns into a competition to see who’s the first to break the net, even though the three of them know that those nets are made of the hardest material on Earth: rope.

And then - a thunder rumbles, and Shirou’s tension, which had been slowly melting away through the training, comes back in full force.

Nae, who has the ball, stops running to look at him. She hesitates, before saying, “Shirou—”

“Keep - keep training,” Shirou says, arms moving up as if to hug himself. He seems to notice what he’s doing, and drops them down like hot potatoes. “We. Have to keep training.”

“Uh,” Nae blurts, mind in overdrive. “No we don’t. We can stop if you need to.”

“...I - I don’t need to,” he lies, like a liar. Seriously, who does he think he’s fooling? Since the thunder sounded, he’s gone like three times more small! Honestly.

Nae sighs. She guesses she can spare his pride for once. But just this time. She doesn’t intend to deal with this bullshit forever.

She raises her chin and scoffs and channels her inner snob. “Well, _I_ do. My legs are the sorest they’ve been in quite a long time!” It’s a lie, obviously; this version of herself may not have trained for long, but running is serious business, and she did it for nine years. Really, she’s not even tired right now.

But for the sake of acting, she waddles towards the edge of the field and plops her ass then and there, ignoring the splash! and the way her uniform starts to go wet. She hopes she doesn’t catch a cold for this.

She pats the ground next to her, for the boys to sit, but they hesitate. Nae glares at Gouenji. Doesn’t he see that they need to make Shirou stop? Or does he not care? Because if he doesn’t care about his teammates, she’s going to have to reevaluate her opinion of him.

Gouenji closes his eyes, somewhat like he’s replacing sighing for it, and then he walks towards her and, without breaking stride, sits on top of a puddle without twitching. His face is as cool as ever. There’s a wet stain on his uniform, but it doesn’t make him look less uncool. How. _How_. Nae wants to borrow some of his awesome, always-look-dignified powers.

They both stare at Shirou, who’s looking at them like they’ve just given him the biggest backstab ever. And maybe they have, but she refuses to feel regret about it. The boy needs rest, man. Especially when he’s still shaking like a leaf.

Nae pats the ground where Gouenji’s not sitting on a little more insistently. And because you can’t play football alone, no matter how much you want to, Shirou comes, and sits down in between the both of them. She’s so proud of him.

Another thunder explodes. 

Shirou yelps, and his knees knock against each other with how much he’s shaking. The lower half of his face is buried in Atsu - _his_ fluffy, white scarf.

Wordlessly, Nae scoots closer to him, until their sides are pressed together. That doesn’t seem to relax him — he’s trembling so much that it’s as if Nae’s pressing against a vibrating chair. And not a pleasing one at that.

She has to do something. She has to do something and she doesn’t know what it is but she has to do it. There’s a boy in plight right here, right next to her, and she can’t let him be in plight anymore. She has to help, she has to help, she has to help.

And so, because she’s never been the one with the bright ideas, she goes like _to hell with it_ , and takes his hand. It’s soft and loose enough that, if he doesn’t like it, he can take it out of her grasp. 

He doesn’t. He just - tightens his hold until her fingers forget what blood is, and doesn’t look up from his scarf during the entire time. The shaking has receded, but it’s still there, and a thunder might come down again at any second. The rain has also gotten more intense. They’re going to catch a cold if they don’t dry themselves in the next five minutes.

But instead of doing the smart thing and asking to go back to the crowded caravan, she says, “Do you… want to talk about it?”

And Shirou. Shirou hesitates, because of course he does, he’s one of the most private people in the caravan. The three of them are, even if Nae only is because she doesn’t want to deal with people not believing her or pestering her with painful questions about the other dimension. 

But then — surprisingly — he starts to speak. “When I was little—” He breathes in, out. Nae’s grip on his hand tightens, and he reciprocates. “I’m - I’m scared.”

When it becomes clear that he isn’t going to continue, Nae presses. “Scared of what?” she asks, even though thunders is an obvious answer.

“...Avalanches.”

Gouenji tilts his head at the apparent non-sequitur — why do avalanches matter now, he must be thinking — but Nae knows. And Nae knows because this was the exact same fear that the her universe’s Shirou had. His family died in one, she remembers. All but Atsu—

...

...She kind of doesn’t like where this conclusion is going. 

A-anyways. Now’s not the time to draw probably incorrect conclusions, soooooo let’s stop. Yeah!

Shirou, Shirou is scared of avalanches the same way Nae is scared of snowstorms, the same way both of them are scared of being alone. Nae gets it. Half the population from Hakuren gets it, but Nae in particular. Her situation wasn’t the same as Shirou’s, but the feelings were close enough, and she can totally relate to this. 

She’s glad there aren’t many sounds that resemble a snowstorm in daily life, because she probably would react along the same lines as Shirou. Well, maybe better, because this Shirou is clearly experiencing the full brunt of trauma and Nae has - has managed to smooth it out into a barely noticeable _there_. 

“And being alone, right?” she asks, before the silence gets too much and Shirou thinks they’re rejecting his fears.

He blinks hazy eyes away, and looks at her with so much surprise that honestly, she should be offended. She’s not, of course, because this is not about her, and even if it were, her skin is not that thin.

“Right…” He looks away from her, at the horizon, and she follows his gaze. There’s a storm approaching. Another thunder is going to come at any minute now. They should move, before it does and Shirou has another heart-attack. 

Again, Nae doesn’t suggest it. She just hums, and waits for Shirou to keep on telling his story. If he wants to. Only if he wants to.

After what seems like an eternity later, he does. “I’ve been scared almost all my life. Ever since - Ever since…” He trails off, takes a deep breath. Buries his head in his scarf so much that his voice comes out muffled. “I. I want it to stop.”

“Then make it stop,” Gouenji says, with all the grace of a sledge hammer. He must see the alarmed look Nae throws his way, because he adds, “No one can do it but you. It’s your mind. What’s the use of telling us if we can’t do anything?”

Um, what the hell. “Are you serious?” Nae snaps, more than a bit miffed. Gouenji seemed like the kind of guy who had tact; it’s been a long time since she’s been this degree of mistaken. “Are you actually serious? Is this something you considered right to tell someone who’s sharing trauma right now?”

Gouenji narrows his eyes. “Am I wrong?” It’s a rhetorical question, a challenge, but really? _Really_?

“Yes!” she says without hesitating. Is this - is this a conversation that she really has to have? “Telling people helps! Venting helps! Psychologist wouldn’t exist if it weren’t!”

“You’re the only one who can solve your problems.”

Nae pauses. “Well, yeah,” she admits, “but other people really, really help, even if you’re the one who does the most effort. You need a support system!”

“Venting is useless. Why burden someone with your problems when they won’t be able to do anything?” he says, frowning. Clearly, he has some history in here that she’s stepping all over.

Well, tough luck.

Nae bristles. “It’s _so_ not useless. Like, maybe it doesn’t solve the problem _directly_ , but it can go a long way about clearing your head! And acceptance that your problems matter is also pretty nice.”

Gouenji doesn’t answer, but it’s clear by the stubborn tilt of his mouth that he doesn’t agree. Nae sighs. This is one of those cases where they’ll have to agree to disagree, because really, there’s no way they’ll manage to convince the other. Nae will die on this hill, at least. 

She tries not to be angry at Gouenji for having a different opinion, but - it’s pretty difficult. This kind of things make her go wild.

Anyways, she’ll force herself not to get angry at Gouenji later. Right now, this is not about her, about them. They’re here for Shirou, even if Gouenji finds it useless, and currently Shirou is standing literally in the middle of their discussion. Poor guy.

He hasn’t pulled his hand out of her grasp, which is… a good signal? She hopes it is, that it means he’s finally accepting help. Her help. 

The rain starts to fall harder, of that’s even possible. Gouenji gets up from his comfortable seat in the puddle and looks at them expectantly. Nae blinks back. Shirou’s eyes don’t appear from between his scarf. 

And so, Gouenji shrugs, and leaves. Nae blinks again. Oh. Was he telling them to go back to the caravan with him? Well, too late now to follow him, she guesses. Shirou doesn’t seem like he’s in the mood to move, even if they really probably should. She’s already scheduling this week to stay in bed with a bad cold. Hitomiko is going to kill them, if the cold doesn’t kill them earlier.

They stay in silence for a bit. She’s waiting for Shirou to gather his thoughts. _If_ he wants to say something, of course. She’s not going to force him or anything. She’s perfectly content staying where they are and dying of hypothermia.

Another thunder comes down, and Nae winces, eyes flickering instinctively towards Shirou. Towards Shirou, who… hasn’t moved, not even an inch. Wow, he really must be deep in thought. Like, woah.

She - hopes he’s not disassociating or something like that. What are the symptoms for that anyway? 

Ah, she can’t do anything about it if she doesn’t know, so her best bet is just to wait and see and hope. Nae’s never been the most patient person ever, but even she can tell that this moment is important for Shirou, and that she has to let him think without disturbing him.

And so, time passes in silence.

And then, Shirou begins to talk.

“When… I was little,” he begins, almost too quiet to be audible, “I had a mother, a father, and a brother.” _Had_ . Nae’s chest constricts with unprompted deductions, but - _listen to Shirou listen to Shirou, this is not about you it’s about Shirou_ — “My brother and I, we played football. We were the best at it!”

“Really?” someone says. It takes her a minute to notice that it’s her voice.

Shirou’s hand grips hers like it’s a rope and he’s hanging over an abyss. “Yeah. I think you’ve heard of him.”

(He’s clearly thinking about their first conversation, but Nae isn’t going to acknowledge it. Nope, not at all! No way in hell.)

“Oh,” she says, not daring to ask for his name because she’s a coward. Her chest is stinging, but she will flee from logic if it’s the last thing she does. She can’t confirm it. She can’t. 

Thankfully, Shirou’s doesn’t say his brother’s name. He begins telling funny stories about what he and his brother got up to, and Nae would have laughed if the atmosphere weren’t so solemn, if her chest allowed room for any feeling aside from anxiety and dread.

Shirou’s shaking increases as the story continues. His hand has left hers, and it’s now hugging his body, clutching with enough strength to break a bone. “We were on our way back from a match… We were on our way back when - when… An _avalanche_ —”

It’s good that there aren’t any more thunder, ‘cause if there were one right now, Shirou would have died of a heart-attack. As it is, the rain just keeps poking their faces, but by now, Nae finds it more comforting than cold. It sort of - grounds her to reality, or something like that. She guesses it’s the same for Shirou.

Automatically, she leans into his space and envelops him in a hug. Maybe that way he’ll stop trying to tear his own arms off. He buries his head in her shoulder, and she buries her head in his hair. “You don’t have to continue if you don’t want to.”

Nae feels more than sees Shirou shaking his head. “No, no! I want to. It’s just…”

“It’s difficult,” she finishes for him. He nods against her shoulder.

Time passes again as Shirou gathers his thoughts. She refuses to think about anything, so she tries to count how many droplets of rain hit her face per minute. It’s an impossible endeavour. By the time Shirou begins, she still hasn’t managed to keep track of them — too many hit her face in a second to keep track of them.

“We were coming back from a match.” Shirou’s voice goes clipped and numb. Is that good? She doesn’t think that’s good. “An avalanche struck the car. I was the only survivor.”

And yeah, ever since he mentioned being scared of avalanches, Nae could guess the story, but she still can’t help tensing up in horror. She forces her body to relax, because Shirou’s still leaning on her and he doesn’t need outside feelings. He’s sharing his life story. He should be able to wallow in peace.

And so, as he tells her about how the car spun around and fell of a mountain, about how heavy and cold was the snow pressing against him, about how he screamed for his family but only three tired firemen came for him, her shoulders remain relaxed, calm. Her heart is hammering against her ribs, her hands are shaking (and not from rain), and the world is closing in around her, and, finally, Nae dares to ask.

She has to know. Based on his story, she suspects, but suspecting isn’t the same as knowing, and if she doesn’t know… the uncertainty will be with her the rest of her life, even if she manages to return to her world. She has to know, she has to know, she has to know.

And so, Nae bites the bullet, removes the band-aid, and says, “What was your brother’s name?” with a chirpy tone that, right now, doesn’t belong to her. 

Shirou apparently notices that this moment is important to her, because he unsticks himself from her side, drags her hands to his lap, and looks at her firmly in the eyes. Nae looks back; she doesn’t know why, but she does, even when averting her glance would have been way easier.

She had never noticed before, but, in his grey eyes, there’s a beautiful orange tint swimming. A familiar orange.

(And oh, she knows. She’s known from the very beginning, even if she’s refused to admit it, fighting with teeth and nails against the truth.

But in that moment, she’s forced to accept it. The orange is familiar because she’s seen it a thousand times before — right after waking up, during training, after scoring a goal, after winning a match, in class, in school trips, in her house, in his house, in a friend’s house, at midnight, in the morning - )

“...Atsuya,” he says, and Nae closes her eyes. 

( - in a festival, cheating during an exam, watching a movie, watching a series, reading a book, skateboarding, ice skating, hiking through the snow, while she was sick in bed, while he was sick in bed, the anniversary of her mother’s death, the anniversary of his parents’, on Christmas - )

She forces her lips to move. She unglues the word from her constricted throat. “Oh.”

The rain is still hitting her face.

( - during at school presentation, while chasing him after a prank, on New Year’s, with fireworks reflecting on it, in complete darkness, during the middle of the day, during a ouija, asking for sweets in Halloween, while being lectured, while being congratulated, while eating lunch, while sharing lunch with him, while she shares with her, while - )

She can’t see what Shirou’s doing (while - ), but something warm and silky covers her hand, and she cracks one eye open to stare at white. (while - ) At a white scarf. She knows this white scarf like the palm of her hand. She’s had to stitch it before, in ano(while - )ther time, in another life. 

Abstently, she runs her hand through it. It’s way more (while - ) silky and softer than she remembers; Shirou must have taken a lot better care of it than At(while - ) (while - ) (while - ).

Than him.

Shirou moves his mouth, Nae sees, but she doesn’t hear anything. Oh, wait. It’s retarded. Since when can the world go with lag, she doesn’t know, but it’s what’s happening here. “Thanks for listening,” he has said, quiet and (while - ) calm. “I needed that.”

And - and he musters a little smile, the most honest one Nae’s ever seen plastered on his face, both iterations of him counting. Nae smiles back, and it doesn’t feel as plastified as she would have guessed (while - ), considering her current mood. The pain on her chest gets a little lighter — just a little, but a noticeable little.

Her lungs are constricted, just when she - oh, maybe she’s crying. It’s raining too hard to be sure, but everything fits. Her eyes are stinging a little, even. She’s never been ashamed of crying, but suddenly, she’s glad for the rain. 

She can’t think. She can’t think. Her mind is still and in movement at the same time, running thousands of thoughts but never acknowledging any of them. She can’t think, she can’t think, she can’t think she can’t think she can’t think—

“You’re welcome,” she manages to say. Her voice isn’t as shaky as she could have expected, but then again, it’s quiet enough that any tone or subtlety is lost to the sound of rain. And then, “Let’s go back to the caravan, no? Before we catch hypothermia.” The cold is already a given.

She needs to cry for a little, and in the caravan while (while - ) (while - ) everyone is asleep sounds like a good plan.

Of course, that means she has to get through dinner first, but Nae’s strong. She’ll manage.

Probably.

She’s holding out admirably, though. Maybe she’s not talking with people as usual, and every bite of salad revolts in her stomach, when, on normal days, she devours two or three or eight bowls of the delicious food, but -

At least she’s not crying. That’s all she can ask, given… the day she’s had. 

Everyone is buzzing with nerves from the match, so they don’t seem to have noticed. Honestly, she prefers it like that, even if someone noticing would have been… not nice, but flattering. Sort of like she’s finally a part of this team instead of a last-minute stowaway.

Endou is chattering away about some hissatsu he found in his late grandpa’s notebook. The Earth, he calls it. Something about needing the full team to be as one or something like that. They’re going to practice it tomorrow, which coincidentally is the last day before the match against Genesis and a bit late to start developing a decisive, eleven-player hissatsu but eh, Endou’ll know. Or Hitomiko.

Practically everyone on the team is listening. Everybody except: Kogure, who’s probably pulled a prank and is waiting for it to snap — she eyes her food distrustingly —; Shirou, who’s eating mechanically and probably not noticing his surroundings; and Kabeyama, who’s giving his own plate the stink eye — probably the target of Kogure’s prank, then, because Kabeyama is known for jumping to eat the food in front of him.

Because she doesn’t know where to focus her attention — she’s not in the mood for football conversations right now — she focuses her tired attention on him. On him, picking up some sauce and spilling it all over his omurice, in a desperate attempt to make what he’s about to eat more edible. Kogure snickers quietly.

That brings a question to her mind: if he knows what’s there, he could _not_ eat it, so… why doesn’t he? Is he that worried with wasting food? She doesn’t know his background, so he _may_ be from a poor household and therefore appreciates food or something like that… but that’s just speculation.

Kabeyama’s spoon stabs into the omurice with surprising delicacy, and he lifts the utensil slowly, very slowly, towards his mouth. The spoon is so full that the slow speed is advised, but… it seems too intense to be for that. Meaningful? Maybe she’s exaggerating a little; this is just food. Don’t overthink it.

Then, he stops, just as the metal touches his mouth. Kogure is holding his breath in gleeful expectancies, but Kabeyama isn’t looking at him. No, his eyes settle, for a brief second, into… her. Her, as in Nae. Her, as in the girl he’s never spoken much too, though they are in friendly terms.

...Okay? Okay, she can roll with it.

But then, without breaking eye contact with her, Kabeyama puts the spoon’s little head into his mouth and - and screams, fire coming out of his mouth and round eyes out of their socks. It’s a common enough occurrence than the ones speaking about the Earth don’t even pause (except Haruna, who reprimands Kogure for laughing his ass off), but, for some reason, it startles a giggle out of Nae.

Kabeyama looks satisfied at that, and Nae blinks because oh. _Oh_. She’s before the nicest guy ever, and not nice guy as in Nice Guy™, but as in a honest to God kind boy. She’s met a lot of them, but wow, this gesture, in its surprisingness, has to be the gentlest ever. 

She resolves herself to find out when his birthday is, and give him the best gift he can hope for. She’s rich, she can afford it. 

She finishes her dinner before she remembers what was troubling her before. Her mood instantly drops, but hey!, she’d managed to lick off her bowl. Kabeyama is an angel.

Night eventually comes crashing down, and with it, everybody Nae has been trying to avoid since that first day in this dimension. 

Heck, she’d been trying to avoid it until now, until it was inevitable. She’d volunteered to lower everyone’s seats into makeshift beds, to help the managers carry the blankets, to fluff everyone’s pillows. It had gotten to the point where Hitomiko had had to order her to go to sleep — she was being _that_ productive.

And so, as she rests her pretty little head into an unusually fluffy pillow, Nae can’t escape from thinking. She thought she had come into terms about not running away earlier but hah!, turns out her mind is much more cowardly than she imagined. Heh. Heh.

It’s not funny, but she kind of wants to laugh.

But she can’t make any noise until everyone is deeply asleep, and even that way she risks someone overhearing. Well, technically she can, but she doesn’t want to — while she fully supports expressing emotions in front of people, the… the emotion she’s feeling now is one she prefers to explore in private. It’s nothing against Raimon, really.

Such is the hard life of a dimension time traveler.

Nae shouldn’t be wallowing in a pity party, but she kind of deserves it. C’mon, she’s just discovered a horror story about this world, and one that relates to her, even though it really, really shouldn’t. Shirou’s past isn’t about her. It still has affected her, and she can’t do anything about her feelings.

Annnnnnd she can tells she’s still fleeing from thinking it. Come on, Nae, you can do it. Come on. Come on. Come on. Think it. Come on.

Here, let’s count to three; one… two… three… three… three…

 _Three_...

Ah, who’s she kidding. There’s no way she can think about it, not yet. She’s not ready. Maybe she will never be. She shouldn’t pressure herself with this kind of things, even if it would be pretty nice to get over it quickly.

But for that, she needs to acknowledge the problem. And her stupid mind refuses to.

Her breathing hitches, and she doesn’t bother to try to keep it under control. If the others notice - well, good for them. She’s not going to be rude to them if they ask, but she would highly prefer that they don’t. Well, kinda. She’d also like to be noticed, but she doesn’t really want to deal with it. Human contradictions at their best.

Her eyes sting, but Nae does control the tears, if only because she doesn’t want to start full out sobbing in front of everyone. And it’s easier to notice tears than irregular breathing. And easier to explain away. If someone asks, will she explain away? She’s not really sure, but the chance to do it is nice.

Suddenly, she needs to know what time it is. There’s no clock to hear tick-tocking away, so Nae pulls out her phone. 4:08. Way later than she imagined. Hours seemed to pass like seconds, apparently.

She’s hit by the urge to move, to go take a walk in the middle of nowhere at asscrack in the morning. That’s obviously a bad decision, but she can’t help but curse the fact that she can’t. Why did she have to take the seat in the corner, the furthest one from the door? Like, she wanted to be close to Shirou, but now she can’t get up without waking up the entire caravan. Really, past Nae, you can’t take any good decision, huh?

That prevents her from going out at night and probably being kidnapped, yeah. But! She just wants to complain to take her mind off things because she’s a coward who can’t deal with reality. You hear, Nae? Coward! You can’t even force yourself to adm—

A hand touches her shoulder blade delicately. A whisper: “Nae-chan?”

Nae stills. She knows this touch. She knows this voice. Why is Shirou awake? Why is he _touching_ her? Did she wake him up?

Okay, Nae, breathe. In. Out. In. Out. In.

Plastering a small smile on her face, she turns around to look at Shirou’s grey eyes. Why she feels the need to remark on the colour, she doesn’t kn - she _does_ know, but again, she’s too much of a coward to admit it. 

“Yeah?” she says, and it comes out in a way smaller voice than she intended. Guess the knot on her throat is physical, huh? 

Shirou winces, and yeah, she knows the feeling. She’s probably a mess right now, probably not pleasing to see, probably would be better to turn back around and pretend this hasn’t happened. She doesn’t, but only because this is Shirou and she loves him.

There’s a silence. Shirou is inspecting her, for some reason, and Nae doesn’t move or speak. It’s only because she doesn’t really have the energy to do either, but nobody has to know that.

Eventually, Shirou remembers that he started a conversation, and finally says, “What’s the matter?”

And Nae is ready to snap, ready to tell him where he can put his worry, is already opening her mouth to do so, when she stops. Breathes in, breathes out. Thinks.

Shirou told her his backstory when she asked, so the minimum she can do is to be polite with him. He’s a friend and he’s clearly worried about her and she can trust in him. She can trust in him to believe her… right?

Welp, she’s going to find out now, because once the idea to tell him everything has gotten into her head, it won’t leave, and she’s not in the mood to deal with more thinking. Besides, she would be a bit of a hypocrite if she told Gouenji that telling people helps and then got angry when the same situation presented to her.

“Okay,” she breathes out. Shirou’s dazed eyes snap to attention. Whoops! Has she taken that much time thinking? Whoops! “This is… pretty unbelievable.”

“I’ll believe you,” Shirou says instantly. Her chest does weird, platonic somersaults. She’s so lucky to be friends with someone so adorable and trustworthy and lovable and, and, and -

She loves him a lot, even if it would be weird to tell him that at his point in their friendship. She’ll tell him later. When the time comes, there won’t be a day where he doesn’t hear how loved he is.

“Okay,” she repeats. Clears her throat, because it came out too raspy and she can’t spill her life story with a voice that ugly. “Okay, so… Um. Do you, er.” She pauses to gather her thoughts. “Some months ago, I woke up in another dimension. And in the past. I woke up in _this_ dimension. Which isn’t mine. Originally.”

She pauses again, but this time to eye Shirou’s reaction to it. It’s all well and good to say that you’ll believe her and another to demonstrate it, so his reaction here is pretty important. Aside from slightly wide eyes and a parted mouth, there aren’t many signs of surprise, and none of disbelief. 

So there are three options: 1) Shirou is the best actor ever (probably not true, because she knows for a fact that Midorikawa is); 2) he doesn’t have any fucks left to give about reality (somewhat true? - he’s probably not at the point of giving zero fucks, but he’s getting closer day by day); or, 3) he believes her, as he said he would.

She kind of wants it to be number three. It’s probably number three. Shirou may be many things, and a liar is not one of them; it’s always been one of their points in common against - his brother, who lies (lied) as easy as breathing. So she wants to trust him, and he probably deserves it. That’s… great. That’s great! They’re off to a perfect start.

She wonders if the rest of the caravan is listening, and then discards the thought. They can listen if they want to, as long as they don’t pressure her with disbelief or something like that. Although they don’t seem like the type to do that. Maybe Hitomiko.

“Yeah?” Shirou presses when the silence stretches on, something entirely her fault. Focus, Nae, focus!

“Yeah.” She coughs. “And this universe is pretty similar to my - my old one, but it’s also different in the most - “ horrible “ - weird ways. Like, in my universe, the guys from Aliea academy aren’t aliens. Like, I don’t think they’re aliens here, but in the other universe they didn’t even pretend to be.”

“They’re not _aliens_?” Shirou says, all blinking and confused and adorable. Aw, he believes in aliens. Or maybe in everything people he trusts tell him. Aw.

There’s some noise two rows of seats ahead, but Nae doesn’t bother to change positions to see if someone is awake or if it’s just snoring. She doesn’t really care that much, about them overhearing.

“Probably not. Really, what kind of aliens destroy planets using _football_?” Pffft. It’s ridiculous, how much people are ready to believe. 

Shirou looks to his side, ceilingwards. “Mm. Point.”

“Right? Anyways, it’s pretty - “ horrible “ - weird to be fighting about old friends. Old friends who don’t recognise me.” There’s a pressure on her chest, and Nae aborts the motion to push it down. She’s opening up, so there’s no need to ignore her feelings. In fact, the entire point of this conversation is for her to not do that.

“Oh.” Shirou blinks, as if that possibility hasn’t occurred to him. He shifts to look at her again. “Were we friends, er, before?”

Nae’s mouth is dry. She runs her tongue through it before speaking. “Yeah,” she says. “We were.” A pause. “And we are now, too.” Right? She doesn’t phrase it like a question because it would be lame and insecure, but if Shirou wants to deny it right now, he can. She really, really, really doesn’t want him to, but he can.

“Oh.” Shirou blinks again. Squeezes her hand. She squeezes back. “I’m sorry.”

Now it’s her turn to blink. “What for?” She runs her mind for something he could have done that he has not apologised for yet, but nothing comes forward. 

“For not remembering you.”

She can’t help it: she snorts. “C’mon, don’t go all martyr on me,” she says. Maybe it’s a little too harsh, but really, he doesn’t need to have more guilt over things he cannot control than he already does. “It’s not your fault. You’re from this universe; why should you know what happens in others?”

Shirou grimaces. It’s obvious she’s right, even if he’s being stupid about guilt. “Well, yeah, but…”

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“But nothing!” she presses on, raising her tone more than she should with everyone asleep around her. At Shirou’s alarmed look, she lowers it again, “Anyways, it’s pretty shitty, but I’ve been managing, mostly. Somewhat.”

“Yeah?”

“No,” she blurts out. It’s finally time to stop lying to herself. In a rush of words, she adds, “No, I’m so not managing. Well. I kinda am, but I’m not okay with my situation. I miss everything. But if I went away now, I would also miss this. And besides I don’t even know how I got here, let alone how to go back. I don’t know if - if this is temporary or not. Every morning, when I wake up, I’m like, will I be home? And there’s lots of feelings in me ‘cause I’m not sure what I want to happen.”

As the words stumble out of her mouth, her heartbeats quickens, her breathings turns shorter and faster and oh man, she’s getting pretty anxious, huh?

“That’s an understatement,” Shirou says wryly. Did she say that outloud? “Yeah, you did. ...Do you need a hug?”

“Yes,” Nae says instantly, not one to look to a gift horse in the mouth. “I do, in fact, need a hug.”

In the next second, noodly arms are enveloping her (“my arms are not noodly,” comes the offended mutter from the mouth pressed into her shoulder) delicately, almost as if they are scared of hurting her. Nae has no such compunctions —- she hugs Shirou, and _squeezes_ , as if he were toothpaste.

“Oof,” he says, but she doesn’t relent. She needs this, and she needs it now, so the only way he can get her to stop is if his spine starts to crack. As it’s currently not doing that, though, she contents herself with breathing and totally not thinking about anything.

There’s more she wants to tell, but her earlier little monologue has left her kind of word dry, so this is a good pause while she recovers. Shirou is just so squishable, like a cute teddy bear, only better because he’s a person with thoughts and all those things that make humanity great.

There’s a long, silent minute, where she can’t even hear the rest of the team breathing. She doesn’t know if that means their listening in and decided for some reason to hold their breaths or that they’ve all asphyxiated in their sleep. On second thought, that latter option is a bit alarming. Her mind shouldn’t come up with this kind of things, man.

Let’s go with the theory that they’re listening in, if only so that she stops conjuring these stuff. She didn’t use to be so morbid.

Eventually, she’s ready to continue spilling her life story, and she nudges Shirou to signal that he can stop hugging her. He does stop, but he doesn’t move back again, so they’re left with one inch of distance between their bodies.

“Okay, so,” Nae says, clearing her throat a bit. “Where was I?”

“...Mixed feelings about, er, dimension travel,” Shirou answers, with an expression that clearly says _I never thought I would have to say that completely seriously_ . She understands. During her stance here, she has had to drop lots of preconceptions about what she would never say, like _we’re going to defeat those aliens! with football!_ and things along those lines.

Metaphorically, a light bulb appears over her head. “Oh, right, that’s true!” she says, smiling a little. “The thing is, I don’t think it’s in my hands whether I return or not, so I really, really shouldn’t worry about these things. But I do, and it’s pretty - “ horrible “ - uh, awful.” 

Haha, that wasn’t a good word substitute. Now Shirou’s gone all contemplative and sad. Well, contemplativer and sadder, but still. Still. She doesn’t want to add fuel to the fire.

“And!” she continues, hoping to turn the conversation to happier places even if she doesn’t know how. “And…” Shit. “And, well, I’ve made lots of friends here so it’s not all that bad. Even if…” She swallows. Pauses. 

She can’t do this. She can’t do this.

“Even if?” Shirou presses when it becomes clear that she can’t do this.

But.

But they’re just words, aren’t they? If she says them… nothing really would change. The world will continue spinning, the sun will rise and come down again, seasons will pass… and nothing will change. Although relieving, the thought is a bit sad. After all the effort Nae has to go to to even fathom saying them, it won’t change anything in the long run.

But maybe for her, it will. If she admits the truth… It probably will hurt. Scratch that — it definitely will. But you can’t heal until you rip off the band aid; okay, you can, you rip the band aid when you’ve finished healing, but this is not a band aid and that was a bad metaphor.

“I was friends with Atsuya,” she blurts out before she can convince herself not to. “Like, best friends. Spent lots of time together, him and I, even if most of it was bickering and everything. In my dimension, only your parents died in there, and you got to grow up together.”

Shirou swallows. “We did?” he says in a small voice. A really, really small voice. Oh, man. She hopes she hasn’t triggered a meltdown, ‘cause if she has, she’s actually going to cry. Cry as in like sobbing, not cry as in a few tears sliding down her face. That’s already happened, and she has already stopped it.

Tread carefully, Nae. “Yeah, you did.” Shirou bites his lower lip, but doesn’t react apart from that. Is that a good signal or horrendously bad one? “Do you want me to tell you more about him?” Oh my God why has she offered. Oh my God is she dumb. She is very, very dumb, it seems. It won’t only hurt her soul, but his.

Please refuse please refuse please refuse please refuse—

“...Okay,” he answers, in the softest most hopeful voice imaginable and oh my God Nae can’t refuse that tone of voice. Now she has to tell him.

She breathes in, out. Her jaw hurts from how hard she’s gritting her teeth. Let’s hope this doesn’t backfire. 

“Well, he is - “ was “ - a little shit, like, pulling pranks everywhere. Especially to me. He had a personal vendetta against me, ‘cause he owed me a favour and I didn’t want to cash it in to mess with him and his sense of equivalency.”

“Mm?”

“He didn’t like owing people things. But he lost a bet and he owed me a favour and well, the rest is what I’ve already told you. He pulled a prank a week on me, and let it be said, they were _big_ pranks. Once, he involved the entire school to pretend that they didn’t recognise me. It was obvious it was a prank, but I still believed it ‘cause, man, the entire school. Even my best friends! Traitors, the lot of them.”

Shirou laughs softly, so she continues, in spite of the way her eyes are starting to blur and sting. “It was so extreme that when I first woke up here, I thought it was a prank. My iDOLM@STER poster was missing, and I’d practically fused it to the ceiling to avoid pranks involving it, but with Atsuya you never know.” Knew. “The only reason I’m still not thinking this is a prank is that you’ve never participated in them, no matter how much he whined, begged or blackmailed.”

“Oh?” Shirou says, and laughs again. The sound is wet, but not a bad wet. Not a good wet either. It just… is.

She laughs too; the same level of wetness. “Yeah, you were... Are? Are. You are pretty strict about pranks. A genius at dodging them, too. I always thought it was because of growing up with him, but you are good here too so…” She was totally not thinking about that during the pranking week with Kogure. Totally not.

Shirou looks away. His eyes are wet, and, when he speaks, his voice is so quiet that Nae has to strain her hearing to hear it. “Atsuya also pulled a lot of pranks when he was… when we were little. I guess I was born with dodging instincts.” He forces a laugh, which honestly, is not as forced as she would have guessed in this situation. “So a me who grew up with him… would be almost omniscient.”

“Oh. That’s, uh, cute.” It is, even if she can’t feel the adorableness right now.

“Mmhmm.”

There’s a silence. 

For some reason, Nae really, really needs to break it. “And, well, Atsuya - he wasn’t all that bad, you know? He was a really dedicated friend, once you managed to weasel into that exclusive club. Like, takes care of you when you’re sick, hugs you when you’re sad… The whole I-would-give-my-life-for-you package. The last memory I have of him—-”

Her voice breaks. She wipes her tears with the back of her hand, before continuing. These are things she hasn’t told even her father. 

“The last memory I have of him…” She gulps. “It’s. He’s hugging me, after finally, _finally_ winning the FF. He and I scored the final goal, you know? With a really cool new hissatsu we’d been practising for weeks. Double Storm Blizzard, which going by the name would be worse than Triple Blizzard but somehow it wasn’t and…”

It’s as if a dam breaks apart. The rush of tears is too strong and sudden to stop it.

“And he’s dead and now he can’t hug me anymore! He can’t hold my hand or pull pranks on me or smile or laugh or cry or anything because this sucks and he’s _dead_!”

And as sudden as that breakdown comes, it goes. Mostly because she remembers that it’s Shirou who she’s talking to. Shirou as in Atsuya’s brother, as in the only person probably more affected by the whole precious-person-is-dead ordeal than her. 

“Oh my God I’m so sorry,” she rushes out, already planning in which canyon she’ll throw the key she’s going to lock her lips with. Shit, her voice is still creaky and rough. “Ignore all that. Everything. Yep. Totally. I’m sorry about saying all that when you’re also coming into terms with your brother. Yeah. I’m really sorry. Really.”

“No,” Shirou says, softly. “No. It’s okay.” It’s really not, though. They’re still holding hands, so it’s really easy to feel his is shaking. If they weren’t covered in darkness, Nae would bet she could see his shoulders shaking too. Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

She doesn’t say anything to that, because she doesn’t want to invalidate his efforts at trying to help her. Because hey!, she feels horrible right now, but at least she’s taken the first step to solve a problem: recognising it.

(Atsuya is dead, Atsuya is dead, Atsuya is dead—)

Recognising it sucks. She hopes the whole healing experience doesn’t suck as much, because then she’s in for lots of big fun. She almost prefers when she was denying reality, except no, she doesn’t. She has to move forward, even if it hurts. Especially when it hurts.

Eventually, the tears run dry. Way sooner than she would have expected, but, then again, she’s tired of being lowkey sad. In their wake, there’s only silence. She doesn’t know if everyone has died while she was speaking or if they’re breathing too softly for her to hear, but there’s not even that to break the silence.

She doesn’t want to break it, either. It’s not exactly comfortable, but this is early morning, after a breakdown and she’s sleeping in a caravan. Nothing is comfortable in this situation.

Of course, everything that is created has to be destroyed, but amazingly enough, it’s not Shirou who does. Shirou, who in her mind has been the only one listening to her, although she kind of knew the others were, too. 

No, it’s not Shirou who breaks it. It’s Gouenji.

“When I was eight years old,” he begins, in a calm, level voice. She imagines him staring at the ceiling, “my mother died. My father cut himself off from everything, including my sister and I, and drowned himself in work. My sister took it in stride, maybe because she was too little to really notice everything, but I didn’t. I… played football a lot, after that. And then, one year ago, my sister was run over by a truck while going to see my match, and I didn’t even have that anymore.”

His voice remains the same during the entire monologue, not even breaking in the last part. She’s not appreciating that enough, though, because her mind is all like, _what? What?_

_Why is Gouenji, mister Venting Doesn’t Work, venting? And after my own rant, too. Did he listen to it? Is this a show of solidarity or something like that? Does he even want to vent? I hope he’s not forcing this out just to put the spotlight away from me…_

“Um,” she says, about to ask one of the questions running through her mind.

Kidou cuts in, in a voice as serene as Gouenji’s. “I was orphaned when I was five. At seven, I was adopted, separated from Haruna, because I caught Kageyama’s eye. In spite of him not being my foster father, I spent most of my days with him, training. I… I started considering something like a father. But he saw me as nothing but a pawn. Sometimes, I wonder if my - feelings for him are the result of his manipulation.”

Oh my God this is horrible. Is Kidou sharing this because of her? Is she unwittingly forcing him to share something so deeply personal? Oh God oh God. And his story is like the saddest thing ever. Being betrayed by a father figure… Not for the first time, she’s suddenly glad for having the father she has. 

But before she can say something — again — about this being unnecessary, even if nice, someone else interrupts — again. This time, it’s Haruna.

“Being separated from you was _awful_. Nobody told me where you went or if you were okay or gave me a way to contact you. And until I was adopted — even when I was — I lay there at night and wondered if you had forgotten about me.”

“Haruna…” Kidou says, voice tight with emotion.

“My mother has never wanted me to play football,” Endou cuts in, musing. “When I was little, she was always hiding the ball I played with or my gloves or my things. She almost never said anything, but I could tell she was thinking it. We’ve already solved it, though! Mostly. But…”

“People are always looking at me, and I don’t know what they want, but I _know_ it’s not me.” This time, Touko’s the one who’s speaking. What’s happening? Why is everyone telling their life stories? “My father always did his best to protect me from the commentaries of the media, but I’m the Prime Minister’s daughter, and there’s no way to shield me from that.”

Eventually, one by one, every player and manager from the team spills the beans about whatever problem they’ve had in their lives; from Kogure — his mother abandoning him in a train station, which makes a strange burst of protectiveness arise low in Nae’s gut — to Megane — impossible expectations from his parents, who want him to be perfect at everything.

Nobody says anything, no opinions are made, but this is the realest moment of team bonding they’ve had as of yet.

These are… surprising revelations. It’s not that she was unaware that her teammates had some hidden depths, but… she kind of was. Yeah, she knew everyone had something to tell, but in between her business and Shirou’s and peripherally, some of the others’, she hasn’t had much time to think about it.

By the time Natsumi finishes wrapping up her story about how she closed herself off after her mother’s death, Nae has one thing clear and one thing to clear up. The clear thing: everyone has listened to her conversation with Shirou, and they’ve felt so sorry about eavesdropping that they’ve shared their stories as an apology. As Nae had already kind of guessed that they were listening but proceeded in spite of it, an apology wasn’t needed, but it was nice.

The thing to clear up:

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait. So you guys all believe me?”

Maybe she shouldn’t have asked that so soon — this night is not just about her anymore, even if it had started like that. The sun has peeked through the horizon enough to shed some light on the scene, and nobody seems upset by her question, so she guesses it’s okay.

“Time travel has to be the only option,” Kogure answers, throwing his arms behind his head. She blinks. “There’s no other way you can hold your own at football so soon while being such a ditz!”

No one corrects him.

For one brief moment, Nae is moved. They believe her. They believe her! Like, she had guessed that some would, because in a team so big there’s a place for all kinds of mindsets, but everyone? This is great!

And then, she realises it was Kogure who spoke, and that he has just insulted her amazing gracefulness.

“Hey!”

Everybody laughs at her, the little bastards. But then again, she’s laughing too, so there’s no room for her to protest.

The next morning is a little bit weird.

First of all, they went to sleep at like, six in the morning, and they have to wake up at nine, so the team is unusually bleary-eyed that morning — even Terumi, who’s usually the personification of elegance. She caught him bumping against a wall in his zombie state.

Second, there’s the sensation that yesterday was all a dream. Like, alright, everybody is asleep on their feet and paying her special attention and that should be decisive evidence, but. But. It’s not. The memory is buried under some sort of haze and honestly, everyone believing a girl when she says she’s from another dimension is so weird that she really can’t believe it.

But then, someone touches her in the shoulder. It’s not delicate, but not rough either; more like determined. She turns around and - yeah, just like its owner. 

“I wanted to apologise,” Gouenji says, eyes boring into her as if daring her not to take this seriously. Uh… “You - were right. Venting isn’t that bad.”

Nae blinks.

And blinks again.

And then, a little smile blooms on her face, along with a burst of energy. “It’s really not, isn’t it?”

Gouenji returns the smile with one of his own and leaves, like the socially stunted teenager he is. Nae shakes her head fondly, a smile still on her lips as she heads towards Hitomiko for the morning planning. That settles it — this is not a dream, it’s just a weird four a.m. sleepover moment. It had to happen sometime.

Once the team is gathered around her, Hitomiko clears her throat. She’s unreadable — more unreadable than usual, she means. Usually, she can take a guess at her mood, but now? Not even a seer can fathom it.

“I was listening last night,” Hitomiko begins — not casual, because she can’t do casual, but the closest she can come to it. And of course she was listening in; everyone was. Really, there’s no privacy around here.

Her eyes scan every player, one by one, as if daring them to be angry at her. As this is shaping up like an apology, it’s a bit weird that she’s being so lowkey aggressive, but that’s Hitomiko for you! And well, Nae’s not even remotely angry, just a bit exasperated. If you listen to something you think you shouldn’t hear, the minimum you should do is pretend you haven’t heard it until you forget. It seems common courtesy rules are different in this dimension.

Nobody else seems angry either, so Hitomiko continues, “I shouldn’t have done that, so, as an apology and a show of trust, I’ll tell you about my relationship with the Aliea Academy.”

“Relationship?” Endou asks, tilting his head, and Nae shushes him ‘cause this is story time! And a show of trust coming from a paranoid person! Impossibilities keep piling up, and the only thing Nae can do is roll with them.

Hitomiko tells them a lot of details about her life, way more than a private person like her must be comfortable to share. She tells them about her late brother, about her father’s downfall, about the orphanage, about the meteorite, and about her mission. Nae sends a mental prayer to the Aliea kids; their father is horrible. 

(Is he that bad in her timeline? She hopes he’s not, because if he is, that means she hasn’t noticed and that’s even more horrible.)

When she finishes sharing her life, Hitomiko breathes in, breathes out, and says, too calm to be genuine, “If you’re uncomfortable with me as your coach, I’d understand. I’m the daughter of our enemy, after all.”

…What? Why would they hate her for that?

As Nae tilts her head, Endou shakes his head exuberantly. “No! No, no, no! You’re a great coach, coach! There’s no way we’d distrust you after everything we’ve been through together!”

“Yeah.” Kidou smirks, and somehow manages to make that smirk look friendly. “After sharing all that, how could we not trust in you?”

The rest of the team choruses their agreement in varying degrees of cheerfulness, Nae’s being the highest to account for her confusion. Hitomiko’s eyes sweep over them once again, and - for the first time, her shoulders relax, her fingers unclench. She smiles, honest and beautiful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> see [@lisonari](https://twitter.com/lisonari)'s [drawing of the Shirou and Nae opening up scene](https://twitter.com/lisonari/status/1318693659022225408). it's great!!!!!


	9. IX: Mount Fuji

The match against Genesis comes way too soon.

Tachimukai is the goalkeeper, because, even if the team really bonded the other day, Hitomiko hasn’t forgotten about his blunder in the Chaos match. Poor Endou: Raimon’s captain, and he can’t even play. 

Not that Nae doesn’t envy him. Like, okay, she wants to play and do something and protect Japan and save the Aliea kids on the way, but she also kind of doesn’t. It’s way too much responsibility! Her shoulders hurt from carrying all that burden!

Endou doesn’t look too upset about it, though. He was solemn when Hitomiko announced the lineup, but, after a mysterious conversation with Hitomiko, his eyes focused, and they haven’t left the people in the field yet. Seriously, every time Nae chances a glance towards Endou, his eyes are boring into someone. It would be creepy, if Endou weren’t so undoubtedly nice. Now it’s just unnerving. 

But seriously, what was that conversation about? Nae tried reading lips, but she’s never been too great at it, so she could only catch words like  _ watch _ ,  _ focus _ or  _ learn _ . She can guess the gist of it with that, but wow, it’s still a big, sudden change for a conversation so simple.

On second thought, eh. As long as everyone is happy and they win the match.

Genesis is as cool and composed and powerful and cool as ever, though. Nae tried to do some of that right-before-beginning banter, but the moment Yagami Reina glared at her, her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. Hey, don’t blame her! Where Nae is a cute little bunny, Yagami Reina is a  _ lioness _ .

When the referee blows the whistle, it sounds like the tolling of bells. One sweeping glance to Genesis’s merciless eyes confirms it. They’re going to die. They’re going to die in the middle of nowhere and she hasn’t spoken to her father in two days.  _ Sorry, Dad. I hope there’s enough of my body left for a funeral. _

The whistle blows. 

Nae gulps, and kicks the ball to Gouenji. A blink later, Tatsuya is running with it. Well, she says running, but she really means teleporting, because wow is he moving. Is this what watching the light move would be like? Because if so, RIP.

“Oh my god,” someone says. Nae totally empathises. There’s no way they can feasably win this. 

The defenders try to stop him, and some almost manage it, but it’s no use — Tatsuya’s is on a lucky streak, and soon he’s shooting Ryuusei Blade at Tachimukai. The poor sap claps his hands and a couple dozen of translucent hands appear behind him, rushing towards the shot, but they vanish before they can even touch it. 

The ball slams on his face and slams him against the net in turn, leaving him crumpled on the grass like wet tissue. Auch. 

“I’m okay!” comes muffled from the floor. Tachimukai flashes everyone a thumbs-up, but when the ball peels itself away from his face, it reveals a bloody nose.  _ Auch _ _. _

Nae looks at the time, and, after catching again Endou’s eyes, finds that they’re only in the second minute of the first half. She sighs — maybe the air will blow away the knot in her stomach — and returns to her starting position.

This time, when the match resumes, Gouenji, knowing what to expect, is able to keep the ball for, like, thirty seconds.before a petite purple-haired Genesis girl that she doesn’t know from her past dimension steals it. Nae would fangirl about her — she’s pretty and cute and small and looks like a bunny — but right now she’s pretty busy running after her. 

_ But _ , she thinks, slowing down until she’s standing still in the center of the field,  _ there’s no way I can catch her. She’s too fast.  _ They’re  _ too fast. The only thing I can do is - trust. Trust in Tachimukai and in the defenders and hope they stop the ball and pass it to me. _ She shakes her head, ruefully, trying to get rid of all negativity and doubts.  _ Let’s hope _ . 

The girl’s figure gets smaller (if that’s possible) as she runs towards the goal, but Nae doesn’t budge. Well, that’s a lie; she moves in the opposite direction to be there when Tachimukai stops the shot and decides to pass it to her. 

There is a non-zero amount of good spots. The Genesis defense has gotten spotty in their arrogance, and she has to take advantage of it. If they don’t manage a tie in the first half, the match might as well be forfeited.

The purple-haired girl passes the ball to Tatsuya, and immediately, another Ryuusei Blade. The asshole is smirking, like, in a  _ take that! _ way. Nae grits her teeth. She hopes Tachimukai stops it, just to wipe that arrogant smirk off his face. 

Nae stays still as thousands of yellow hands appear behind him, this time looking more tangible than the last. She stays still as they manage to touch the ball this time — and not just touch it, but manage to push against it. She stays still as he stops the ball, as he stares, stunned, at it, and as he gets over his surprise to pass the ball to Shirou.

She stays still as Shirou’s and her eyes meet, just for a second, but enough to watch them turn orange and arrogant and familiar. Atsuya (Atsuya!) smirks at her, a hidden message she’s deciphered a hundred times before, and Nae, Nae doesn’t stay still anymore.

She  _ flies _ . 

The Genesis players are no more than silhouettes as she dribbles past them, intangible and harmless. She’s too fast for them to catch her, and she doesn’t even have the ball for them to try to. Behind her, Nae knows without looking, Atsuya is approaching. Not as fast as her, because nothing can be as fast as her when she pours her everything into it, but close enough.

And because they’re a team, even if they haven’t really met in this dimension, even if this Atsuya is a bit cockier, a bit bossier than hers, she knows. She knows what they’re going to do, she knows when they’re going to do it, and she knows when he passes the ball to her without even looking.

Nae extends her foot out, in the middle of a stride, and catches it without blinking. There are some gasps from the Genesis players around her, but she doesn’t care, because this is Atsuya, and they’re finally playing together.

(Maybe for the last time, but she doesn’t want to think about that. This is a time for enjoying without strings attached.)

She can feel Atsuya running just behind her, expectant in preparation for - she knows what he’s preparing for, what  _ they _ ’re preparing for. And so, when they approach the goal, Nae  _ kicks _ , and smiles as a snowstorm emerges, its axis being the ball.

Then, Atsuya hurries to kick it as it flies upwards, and Nae jumps, twisting in the air to smash her foot against the ball while she’s upside down, at the same time Atsuya, above her, does the same. 

The ball flies, leaving trails of ice and cold behind. Nae knows, before her feet hit the ground again, that they’ve scored, and she doesn’t need to turn around to check. The screams and cheers and happiness and sadness of the players surrounding her are enough. Her intuition is pretty great, today.

Still, she can’t resist the smile that worms its way into her face — then again, why would she? She’s happy! They’ve scored! They’re now tied, and things are looking pretty great!

And so, she spins in her place and gives Atsuya the hardest high-five he’s ever been given. “We’re  _ great _ !” she squeals, high-fiving him again. They’re great, they’re great, they’re great! “We’re great, we’re great, we’re great!”

Atsuya gives her a cocky smirk as she skips around — a smirk that gradually turns smaller, arrogant eyes that turn from confident orange to quiet grey. It’s mesmerizing to see - Atsuya’s soul becoming Shirou’s.

“Welcome back,” Nae says, and the smile she gives him doesn’t feel forced. It falls a little with her next words, though. “Are you okay? You didn’t need to do that if being Atsuya hurt you.”

Shirou shakes his head, and buries his nose in the scarf. “I’m fine,” he says, tightening his scarf around his neck, probably so that it doesn’t fall during the match. It’d been getting a bit loose. “I think… we have reached an agreement.”

Nae beams, even though she doesn’t really know what that agreement means; as long as both Shirou and Atsuya can coexist happily, she’s _ ecstatic _ . “Really?! That's great! You’re great!” She claps him in the shoulder, and gives him a spinning hug, and would have given him another if Hitomiko weren’t looking at them impatiently. 

With an abashed grin, Nae squirrels back to her place in the midfield, ready for the match to resume. 

Turns out, Genesis are normal humans. Who knew, huh?

Okay, she didn’t know either, no matter how much that seemed like sarcasm. Like, she knew they weren’t aliens, but once Hitomiko revealed the thing about the meteorite, she thought Genesis would use it too. After all, why wouldn’t they?

The answer is, of course, favouritism. Their jerk of a father clearly wanted Tatsuya and the others as the strongest team. Her heart goes out for the other teams, really. If she were older and had a job and energy and time and a place to live, she would adopt them all. Their father doesn’t deserve them. 

But Nae, how does Raimon discover this fun little tidbit of information?, you may be asking. Well, do not worry, ‘cause teacher Nae is here to answer all your questions! 

They discovered it when their father told the Genesis players to destroy their bodies to break the tie. Nae almost walked over there and slapped him, but Hitomiko, who clearly saw it coming, shot her a frigid glare that made her stop on her tracks. Maybe she should stop resorting to violence if she’s getting so predictable.

Anyways, now Genesis is, once again, nearly unstoppable. And she says nearly because Raimon is going to win, but wow are they going to sweat for it. 

Yagami Reina dashes through Raimon’s side like the predator she is, never wavering, never stopping. It’s awe-inspiring, really, even if it’s tearing Raimon’s pride to shreds. The midfielders, the defenders - there’s no way to even halt her when she’s on a warpath.

And soon, she’s shooting. “ASTRO BREAK!”

Purple light envelops the ball before she kicks it, and man, Nae wouldn’t want to be in front of that particular shot. Somehow, it has managed to dim the light of the field, just to give it more of a creepy, dangerous aura. 

Tachimukai swallows, but he claps his hands with a determined expression, and, as always, thousands of hands, way too many to count, appear at his back and rush towards the shot, but Nae knows before watching it happen that he’s going to lose. Astro Break, although simple, is a shot too powerful when Yagami Reina is the one who does it.

Predictably, the shot breaks through the hands. Nae’s fingers curl, a bit too tightly, but she can’t help it. The ball moves in slow motion towards the net, and her only thought is  _ argh, all our effort, gone just like that _ . 

But then, a foot gets in the way. No — two feet. No! Three! 

Tsunami, Kogure and Touko hold the ball in its place with determined, almost desperate expressions on their faces. Nae’s heart skips a beat, and she crosses her fingers. Please, please, please…! Stop it, please!

A drop of sweat rolls to the ground.

Finally, they all grunt at the same time, and the ball  _ flies _ , flies towards the opposite side. There’s a gasp coming from the benches, but Nae doesn’t care enough to notice, because  _ yes! Yes, yes, yes! They stopped it! _

(Gasping, Endou springs up from his seat, staring pointedly at Touko, Tachimukai and Tsunami. They were amazing. They  _ are  _ amazing. All three of them… together…

And how can he not have seen it before? It was so  _ obvious _ . He’d lost his sight as the captain of Raimon. He has to do better. His team deserves his best, and only that, because that’s what they’ve been offering, time and time and time again.

“Endou,” Coach says, and he whips his head around to meet her eyes. Hopefully, his determination will reach her through his eyes. She smirks. “So you’ve seen it.”

“Yeah,” he says, breathless. his gaze soon returning to the match.

Out of the corner of his eye, Coach gets up, and raises her hand.)

Nae receives the ball, and is ready — anxious, desperate — to run, but then, Hitomiko raises her hand, and everyone stops on their tracks. Absentmindedly, Nae kicks the ball through the out line, and watches unblinkingly as she rises and says, “Raimon changes goalkeepers! Tachimukai, in! Endou, out!”

There’s a silence.

Nae chances a glance at Tachimukai, hoping against all odds that he’s not devastated by this — like, who wouldn’t be, right? Fail twice and get expelled from the most important ever; football is so unfair —. and… blinks. 

Tachimukai looks… well, not happy,  _ obviously _ , but he’s smiling. And it’s not a sad smile, either, just a very complicated one; as in ‘I’m feeling a lot right now’ complicated. He stares at his hands, but, when he looks up, all traces of tangled emotions are wiped off his face. It’s just content.

He walks toward the benches, pride in his gait and in his shoulders. She’s glad. He did good job in here, and it’s great that he knows it.

When he encounters Endou on his way, they stop and exchange brief words. It’s a bit too far to make out what they’re saying, and she doesn’t have a good enough sight to read their lips, but she wants to imagine them cheering each other up. They probably are doing exactly that.

Endou nods, and they continue walking: Tachimukai, towards the benches; Endou, towards the goal.

When Endou steps under the crossbar, it’s like watching a king coming back to his kingdom. He looks  _ so _ right in there, as if he was born under a goal, wearing a goalkeeper uniform. Really, it’s so fitting in him that Nae wouldn’t be surprised to find out that’s true.

He grins widely, clearly thinking the same she’s thinking, and knocks his fists together. The shout is audible before it comes, “LET’S GO, TEAM! WE’RE GOING TO  _ WIN _ !”

“Yeah!” the rest of them chorus.

And Nae grins and everyone grins and this is great, because finally, finally, their captain is home, back where he belongs.

Something warm blossoms in her chest, almost like a hug, but lighter. She looks down, and… oh. Something is - glowing, green and almost imperceptible. She tries to grasp it, but it goes through her fingers. But the warmth is there. She feels it. She  _ feels _ it. This is warmth and love and kinship, manifested physically.

Is this even real? How is this happening? Is she hallucinating?

A quick scan around reveals that, if this is a hallucination, it’s collective. The rest of Raimon are also in the exact same situation as her, which okay? Okay. This is something that’s happening, and it’s not even in the top three of weird things that’ve happened to her, so she has to roll with it. 

Somehow.

Wait- Wait, wait, wait. They’re in the middle of a match. Where’s the ball? Are they even playing right now?

“SUPERNOVA!” comes from the Raimon goal, and at least that solves the questions. It comes with a problem, though, which is Endou being alone before a three-person hissatsu, and a Genesis one at that. There’s no way he’s going to survive that without help.

Uncaring about future strategies, Nae starts to run.

Endou doesn’t look scared, not even nervous, as a literal black hole approaches him, but that could be an act. On second thought, this is Endou, which means it’s not an act, which means he’s not nervous, which means he’s an idiot, and that means that Nae, and the rest of the team, have to hurry.

Her calves are screaming, but she manages to arrive in time to slow down the ball, even at the cost of being sent flying by the power of it. The defenders all get in line, to try what she did, give Endou a chance to stop the hissatsu, but the ball also pulls through. 

Endou still doesn't look worried, Nae contemplates from her nice spot on the floor. In fact, he looks ready to start monologuing.

Which, one second later, is exactly what he does. 

“I’m sorry, guys,” he begins, and Nae blinks. Sorry for what? He’s great. “I had lost sight of our strength at one point, and tried to do everything on my own. I’m sorry for failing you as a captain. But I won’t anymore! Raimon’s greatest strength is our teamwork, and this is the proof!” He closes his right fist as it starts to sparkle. “GOD HAND!”

And, with all the guts a captain has to have, Endou performs his  _ weakest  _ hissatsu. As a golden hand slams into the damn black hole, Nae’s breath leaves her lungs. Oh my God. Oh my God Endou is such an adrenaline junkie. Oh my God does he really have to take this sort of risk just to make a point? It’s precious that he trusts that much in their earlier slowing-downs, but. Oh my God oh my God oh my God.

Nae can’t even get up off the floor, she’s that shocked. The only things she can do is watch as the black hole struggles against the golden hand, a bit like a tug of war. As the fight reaches its climax, a warm, yellow light  _ explodes _ out of the collision, blinding them all and making it impossible to see the conclusion.

And then, it’s over.

The yellow light vanishes, and Endou’s left standing, God Hand still extended and dwarfing the ball in its center. 

Nae blinks. Rubs her eyes. Blinks again. 

The ball is still there.

“What the fuck,” Izuno, a forward from Genesis, says. Nae totally agrees. What the fuck.

After blinking a bit more, she bursts out laughing, the sound ringing in the silence. This - this is great! It’s the most gutsy thing she’s ever seen! Stopping a superpowered team’s superpowered hissatsu with your weakest catch? Only Endou! And he probably didn’t mean it as the biggest middle finger ever, but wow if it isn’t. Nobody here is going to forget this moment, that’s for sure!

The golden hand retracts, and Endou stares at the ball in his hands with the biggest grin ever, all happy and glowing and great. Then, he raises his head to look at Raimon, at all of them, and Nae’s heart skips a beat. The light over it gets more intense.

Endou lowers the ball to his feet, and that movement reveals that his own heart is the one who is shining the most.

“Guys,” he says, grin still as brilliant as ever. Nae has to squint. “I’m going to run out of the goal.” He passes the ball to Kabeyama, and does exactly that, dashes through people with a way better f ootpla y than before the match against Zeus. With the three Genesis forward next to the goal. He really must trust Raimon, ‘cause wow. Wow.

Kabeyama scrambles to catch the ball, and passes it to Kogure, who passes it to Touko, and Touko is passing it to Nae so she has to get up at supersonic speed to receive it. When the ball hits her foot, a rush of happy feelings invades her.

_ Team _

_ Win _

_ We _

_ Football _

_ Fight _

_ Save _

_ Together _

_ Friends _

_ Us _

_ Forever _

_ Kinship _

_ Strength _

_ Raimon _

_ Raimon _

_ Raimon _

_ Raimon _

She manages to pass the ball to Terumi before she gets overwhelmed. Most of the rush of feelings has left with it, but ( _ love love love love - _ ) still lingers. Raimon Is a great team, she reflects as Terumi passes the ball to Ichinose, maybe just as great as Hakuren. And that’s saying a lot, because nothing is better than Hakuren. Except… maybe Raimon.

Terumi passes the ball to Ichinose, and it goes through everyone in the team, before landing at Endou yet again. By this point, their captain is enveloped by a big blue light, more than the sum of all the team’s parts. But Endou always does just that, right? Multiply their strengths. 

Shirou and Gouenji move to stand in a triangle position with him, and a circle of light surges out of the ground to surround them. Eight yellow dots form an even outer circle, pouring their essence into the ball, and Nae’s knees start to tremble by the strain of holding herself up.

She’s bone-deep tired.

Light  _ explodes _ from the ball, flowing up like a geyser, and the three of them jump with it, kicking it as it morphs into green sparks.

“THE EARTH!” they shout, and that’s it.

That’s it.

They win the match, and Hitomiko leaves them to go make a better home for her little siblings. Nae would be worried about a twenty-something woman taking care of almost a hundred teenagers, but this is Hitomiko, so there’s no doubt that she’ll be fine.

When they arrive at Raimon, exhausted and expecting a welcome back party, they’re received with the nastiest surprise of them all: betrayal!

She knows, she knows, she’s being too flippant about it. But hey!, it all turns out okay in the end, even if watching Someoka smirk evilly shaved out ten years of her life expectancy. The moment the Dark whatever’s coach started to explain his malevolent plan, Nae knew that all this situation would require was a painful match, exchanging blood, tears, and so much sweat.

Spoiler alert: she’s right.

The welcoming party comes around one match later, and Nae’s enjoying it, really, but… she could enjoy it more. Smiling into her orange juice, she thinks,  _ I’m going to miss this team _ , with an amount of bittersweetness she never could have imagined to possess. The team is dissolving after this, she knows, and she  _ knows _ she has to let go, but. 

This has been great. Girls’ night, midnight conversations, training until you drop - this eternal sleepover is coming to its physical end, but the memories are unforgettable, and not just for her. That’s sort of a comfort.

Music blasts out of the speakers. Everybody is having fun dancing, singing, talking, and here she is, wasting the present moment while thinking about the past. Unacceptable.

And so, she squares off her shoulders, slams her glass against the table, and sets out to enjoy her last night as a Raimon member. Whether it’s in this dimension or in the other, the future is bright, and she refuses to be scared of it.

The next day arrives, and with it, the goodbyes.

Parting from Touko is one of the hardest things ever, despite having exchanged phone numbers, twitter accounts, tumblr accounts, instagram accounts and even unused facebook accounts. They hugged for, like, five minutes straight, until Rika broke them off for a hug of her own — and that’s Touko, who doesn’t even like hugs! She’s going to be plastered to Endou by the end of the day.

The next stop is Hokkaido, which Nae’s been dreading all morning. At least, it’s not the last stop ( _ that  _ would be a nerve-wracking experience; sorry, Tsunami), but the second isn’t that great. Couldn’t she have had a good number, like the neverth?

No, she couldn’t. She  _ knows _ it. Stop being wistful, Nae. You know saying goodbye hurts, but this isn’t a forever-goodbye, just a see-you-later.

She breathes in and out, repeating the words on her mind until she believes them. Then, she can smile for real and cheerfully return the hugs the rest of Raimon gives her. Even  _ Kogure _ gives her one, and he’s the most skittish person on the team. She doesn’t want to admit it… but honestly, she’s kinda moved.

Endou gives her a bone-crushing hug (her back actually cracks, which is when he lets go with a panicked expression); Rika another one (she doesn’t let go when her back cracks, Ichinose has to distract her; now that’s a real friend); and the rest of the team normal, safe ones, except for Kidou, who gives her the awkward sibling pat. It takes all her mental fortitude not to crack laughing. Kogure doesn’t have the same courtesy.

Eventually, the goodbyes end and the caravan wheels away, towards Kyoto. Shirou and she stand there, in silence, until the vehicle — their home for some of the most trying weeks of their lives — isn’t even a dot in the distance. 

Then, he turns to her with a melancholic smile, and, adjusting his scarf, says, “Ready to go back?”

Nae’s eyes linger in the distance for a second more. But just a second. Once it’s over, she smiles back at him, gathering all the love she can’t give to Raimon any more and pouring it all into her expression. Shirou better like cuddles, ‘cause he’s going to be her main target for a long time. 

If not, he can always call Atsuya. She knows he likes cuddles, even if he likes to be a little bitch about it.

They start walking at a sedate pace to Hakuren. She can’t wait to see her dad! But… she also doesn’t want this moment to end. The moment they step into the school, the team will swarm Shirou (and not her), and it’ll all return to a normal she was never a part of. She  _ will _ be a part of it, but she’s not, yet. Besides, walking like this, for once not having any responsibilities, is nice.

When they’re halfway there, Shirou speaks. “Are you okay?”

She tilts her head to look at him. “Uh, yeah?” What a sudden question. Like, she’s a little sad, but not that much that it needs to be explicitly asked.

“Really?” He blinks. “You’re okay with not having returned to your world?”

“Oh, _ that _ .” She grins. “To be frank, I haven’t really thought about it that much recently. I was more focused on what to do with my life here. You know, if I’m staying.”

Shirou hums. His eyes are way more interested than what a hum would indicate, but he still hums. “What are you going to do?”

“Eh, who knows,” Nae says, and shrugs. “I was planning to join Hakuren’s football club, but…”  _ I’m worried that I’ll be the outsider. That it won’t be the same. _ She doesn’t say it, but it’s plainly audible.

And really, it’s dumb, isn’t it? Like, she also joined late the last time, and the team’s welcome was as warm and, well, welcoming, as could be expected. There’s no reason for it to be that different. In fact, she’d probably be better received, because she’s not entering by nepotism and she’s already proved she’s a good player to all of Japan.

If so, why? Is it because Atsuya won’t be there? Except for the part that he’ll be, along with Shirou. Everybody will be there. Is it because her father isn’t the coach this time? But that shouldn’t change anything that much. Her father wasn’t the best coach ever, to be honest. Then, why -

Shirou knocks their shoulders together with a teasing smile. “I can hear you overthinking from here. Don’t worry too much about it. I’ll be with you when you meet the team again.”

And - that doesn’t really solve anything, it doesn’t, really, but, at the same time, it lifts something heavy off her chest. Nae allows herself to breathe, now that there’s space in her lungs. 

When she looks at the sky, the smile on her face isn’t fake. She splays out a palm to cover the sun, though some of its rays are still peeking from between her fingers. 

Things are looking up.

There’s no telling when — if — she will return to her time, but even if she doesn’t, she still has friends and football and a world of opportunities (like the FFI at the turn of the corner). Not everything can go okay, but  _ something _ has to. As she continues walking towards her school, Nae knows, down to her bones, that she’ll be alright.

“WAIT. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THAT THE FFI DOESN’T ACCEPT GIRLS?!”

**The End**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading until here!! i had a lot of fun writing this, so i hope you had fun reading it too! <3


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